{"id":533365,"date":"2026-01-13T06:35:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T06:35:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/533365\/"},"modified":"2026-01-13T06:35:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T06:35:13","slug":"ksr-postgame-show-listeners-learned-how-to-pronounce-malachi-morenos-name-from-his-mother","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/533365\/","title":{"rendered":"KSR Postgame Show Listeners Learned How to Pronounce Malachi Moreno’s Name from his Mother"},"content":{"rendered":"

Malachi Moreno<\/a> has been a top basketball player in the state of Kentucky for many years. Before he starred for Great Crossing, his brother, Michael, led Scott County to consecutive Sweet 16 Title games. Even though we know the name well, after Malachi\u2019s best performance as a Cat, we realized that we don\u2019t actually know how to correctly say his name.<\/p>\n

During the KSR Postgame Show<\/a>, Matt Jones was giving the freshman center his flowers. The 7-footer had 17 points on 8-10 shooting from the field. He also grabbed eight boards, had six assists, and four steals. Since 1996-97, only two other Wildcats have posted that stat line<\/a>: Rajon Rondo<\/a> and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander<\/a>. He\u2019s in good company with a couple of Cats who have NBA Finals\u2019 rings. <\/p>\n

After heaping praise on the player, Matt Jones received a call from a Kentucky fan who issued a correction. Matt was pronouncing his last name muh-RAY-no. The broadcasters say it slightly different, calling him muh-REE-no. <\/p>\n

This became a point of contention. Fortunately, it\u2019s one the family considers trivial, and they were happy to weigh in on the subject. <\/p>\n

His mother, Sarah, called in to close out the radio show and provide some clarification. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really going to depend on who you ask because if you listen to Malachi when he said it in some Happy Holidays video, he said muh-REE-no. But if you listen to Michael, when he says it, it\u2019s muh-RAY-no.\u201d<\/p>\n

She continued, \u201cWhen you ask people from Georgetown, they say muh-RAY-no. When you ask the announcer at UK, they say muh-REE-no.\u201d<\/p>\n

It turns out, everyone is technically mispronouncing the name. <\/p>\n

\u201cReally, I think you can pronounce it however you want to, but the correct pronunciation in Spanish is muh-RAY-no,\u201d she said while rolling her tongue on the R sound. <\/p>\n

Not everyone can effortlessly roll their Rs. Even if you can\u2019t, you now have the official word from the Moreno family that their last name is like a ray of sunshine. Or if you want to say it a different way, that\u2019s fine by them too. <\/p>\n

I think we can all agree on one thing. It\u2019s always a good night when the Rupp Arena public address announcer is frequently calling Moreno\u2019s name. <\/p>\n

[Listen to the entire KSR Postgame Show from the win over Mississippi State.<\/a>]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Malachi Moreno has been a top basketball player in the state of Kentucky for many years. Before he…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":533366,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3724],"tags":[7,7388],"class_list":{"0":"post-533365","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-malachi-moreno-25-great-crossing"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115886406234755370","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/533365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=533365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/533365\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/533366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=533365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=533365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=533365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}