I’m not sure Mike Hartline was a popular choice in the Bluegrass.

But he was the right choice.

The senior quarterback gives Kentucky the best chance to win right now, and that’s why he was chosen as the Wildcats’ starter.

“We feel that we have three quarterbacks that we can win with in this league,” Kentucky coach Joker Phillips said. “We feel comfortable with all three of them, and that is a good problem to have. Right now, we feel that Mike Hartline gives us the best chance to win. He has been more efficient and is playing faster than the other two.”

The other two were sophomore Morgan Newton and redshirt freshman Ryan Mossakowski.

And while there was a push among some fans for the Wildcats to go with a youth movement, Hartline’s experience was the difference.

He’s also determined to make his senior season one to remember.

A year ago, he was playing some of his best football when he went down with a knee injury against South Carolina. He tried to come back several weeks later against Vanderbilt, but didn’t have enough mobility and was done for the season.

So was the Kentucky passing game, which produced just three more touchdowns in the remaining five SEC games.

For his career, Hartline has thrown 15 touchdown passes and 16 interceptions -- the kind of numbers that cause a fan base to grow restless -- but he's also 8-6 in 14 career starts.

One thing that stuck out to me this spring when I visited with Hartline was how committed he was to making good on his final season.

He’s been through the ringer.

As a sophomore, he was booed by his own fans, later lost his starting job, only to return for the bowl game and lead the Wildcats to a win. And then last season, he missed all but a few plays of the final eight games with his knee injury.

“All the adversity and the injuries and speaking with my brother [Brian], who plays with the Dolphins, I understand what it takes to be an SEC quarterback, to be a senior leader,” Hartline said. “This is the last time around, and I don’t want to have any what-ifs, whether it ends here or continues the next couple of years. I know what kind of team we have and the group of guys we have.”

He also knows this offense and knows how to manage it, which is why he’ll get a chance to lead the Wildcats to a fifth straight bowl game.

It’s not like he’ll have to do it by himself, either, on offense. The Derrick Locke-Randall Cobb tandem is as good as it gets, and senior receiver Chris Matthews has a chance to be one of the more improved players in the league.