Saturday’s field goal win by Kentucky over Louisville brings to mind a controversial song that was in the news 40 years ago this week and WSGS was right in the middle of the fray.

Courier Journal - November 27, 1976: New Song Draws Unpredictable Reactions. “ Drop kick me Jesus,” the song begins, “through the goal posts of life. End over end, neither left nor to right. Straight through the heart of them righteous uprights. Drop kick me Jesus, through the goal posts of life.”

The song, predictably titled “Drop Kick Me Jesus,” written by Paul Craft and sung by Bobby Bare, was released earlier this fall by RCA Records, stirring an unpredictable reaction wherever it has played.

Ernest Sparkman, station manager at WSGS-FM in Hazard, reported he has kept the song in their regular “hot rotation” lineup. “I had some questions about it at first,” Sparkman said. “I listened to it closely and decided it wasn’t sacrilegious. In fact, there are some things in it that are right good.” Sparkman said his station is “careful about what we play.”

At least one country station in Kentucky has banned the song. “We played it a couple of times,” said Clovis Sadler, owner of WGGC-FM in Glasgow. “We didn’t get any complaints, but I didn’t particularly care for the title. There was the possibility of offending the listener.”

A host of radio station managers have sacked the song from the airwaves across the country. “No way we could get away with a title like that,” said Art Davis, music director at WBAP in Fort Worth, Texas.

Mike Chadwell, a disc jockey at WHOP in Hopkinsville, called it an “interesting, funny song.” He said it is played “five or six times a day” and has received “no negative feedback.”

“Our audience keeps us in line,” said WKYQ disc-jockey Jay Diamond in Paducah. ‘If there were complaints, we wouldn’t play it,” he said.

Louisville’s WTMT plays the song “once – maybe twice – in a four-hour shift,” said DJ Kenny Holiday. “I haven’t heard a single complaint.”