SBJ College: The Warren Commissioner

Maybe the Southern Conference shouldn’t have announced its new commissioner on the same day as the Big Ten. The SoCon hasn’t won a head-to-head battle with the Big Ten since Appalachian State beat Michigan.

Here’s what is cooking on campus:

BIG TEN GETS RESPECTED LEADER IN KEVIN WARREN

Warren will become the first African-American commissioner at a Power Five conference

• When news broke last night that Vikings COO Kevin Warren would be the next Big Ten commissioner, replacing legendary Jim Delany, I immediately thought he’s a great catch for a college conference. Not because he’ll be the first African-American commissioner in the power five, but because he’s respected and accomplished enough to be the NFL’s next commissioner.
  
  
• During his emotional introductory press conference today, he shared the story of his recovery from being hit by a car when he was 11 years old. He came back well enough to play college basketball at Grand Canyon Univ., despite the prognosis that he’d never play any kind of sports again. Warren was honored earlier this year as one of our Champions of Sports Business, and in an interview with SBJ Publisher & Executive Editor Abe Madkour, he explained the severity of the injury by saying, “My classmates should have been going to a funeral.”
  
  
• In Warren, 55, the Big Ten found a veteran leader who has become one of the most respected voices in the NFL. During 14 distinguished years with the Vikings, Warren has emerged as a pacesetter for diversity and inclusion. He’s made promoting women a top priority and, most of all, he practices what he preaches. He’s moved four women into top positions in legal, partnerships, people and culture and finance with the Vikings.
  
  
• Warren officially starts Sept. 16 and will step into one of the two most influential positions in college athletics -- SEC commissioner being the other -- with virtually no experience working in college. That rankles some of the more established ADs, who told me they’re frustrated with the recent trend of non-traditional hires. They believe their experience is being undervalued. While Warren may not have a background in college administration, he has so much more to offer the Big Ten.
  
  

SEARCH FIRMS LEAVING NO STONE UNTURNED

• The national search firm, Korn Ferry, led the Big Ten presidents through the process of finding their next commissioner. It should come as little surprise that the firm’s vice chairman and lead college consultant, Jed Hughes, was not discouraged by Kevin Warren’s lack of college experience. Just check Hughes’ track record. Finding candidates off the beaten path has become his calling card.
  
  
• Hughes' strategy is clearly working because conferences continue to turn to Korn Ferry for major hires. Hughes not only led the Big Ten search, but also the most recent commissioner searches in the SEC and Pac-12 (which also went outside the college space in hiring Larry Scott from the WTA). Earlier this year, Hughes placed NBA G League Commissioner Malcolm Turner at Vanderbilt as AD. Turner, like Warren, had no college experience.
  
  
• Firms like Korn Ferry are charged with presenting a diverse pool of candidates at a time when ethnic and gender minorities remain relatively scarce at the highest levels of college athletics, despite gains in recent years. That push for diversity is driving search firms into different sectors, forcing them to dig deeper into pro sports and media to find the most talented leaders for these coveted positions.
  
  
• More emphasis is placed on problem-solving and relationship-building than college experience, based on the search firms I talked to. Hires these days aren’t so much about a college background as they are diversity of talent and diversity of background. The candidates who exhibit those qualities, whether they’ve followed a traditional or nontraditional path, tend to rise to the surface.
  
  
  
  

THIS WEEK IN SBJ

• The same emphasis on analytics that changed the way pro baseball is consumed is now seeping into the college space. I took a look at the growth of TrackMan, the 3D Doppler radar that tracks a ball’s velocity and spin rate. 

SPEED READS

• A highly anticipated matchup of SEC rivals Ole Miss and Arkansas is set for this weekend in the NCAA Baseball Super Regional, and the series has already sold out in Fayetteville. Razorback fans packed Baum-Walker Stadium for the regional round, with Arkansas’ three games drawing 31,426 fans. Ole Miss was no slouch either, drawing 29,352 fans over three games.
  
  
• Out of the American Athletic Conference meetings today -- Tulane’s Troy Dannen will serve a one-year term as chair of the AD’s executive committee and Temple’s Patrick Kraft was named vice chair. Kraft was also selected as the rep to the NCAA D-I Football Oversight Committee.

• Jim Schaus bucked a national trend while AD at Ohio University. According to SBJ's David Broughton, ADs at D-I programs average just over six years in the top position. Schaus put in 11 years in Athens before taking the Southern Conference commissioner role today. One other interesting nugget about OU athletics during Schaus' tenure -- the Bobcats are one of just 15 FBS programs that have never been cited for a major NCAA violation.
  
  

• Kentucky took another group of its football players to Ethiopia last week, marking the ninth straight year the Wildcats have sponsored the foreign service trip. UK’s chief revenue officer, Jason Schlafer, conceived the idea in 2011 after he and his wife adopted a child from the African nation. Boogie Watson, Landon Young and Calvin Taylor Jr. represented the Wildcats last week, along with Schlafer.
  

  This is the ninth year that Kentucky football has organized a service trip to Africa for some players

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