Kevin Warren’s short-term stint with the Big Ten has long-term implications
On June 4, 2019 — just 3½ years ago — Kevin Warren arrived in college athletics, leaving a job as Chief Operating Officer of the Minnesota Vikings to become the commissioner of the Big Ten.
He led a short-lived and disastrous cancellation of the Big Ten football seasons in 2020 due to COVID. It was reversed when the SEC, ACC and Big 12 wouldn’t follow and the league played an abridged season.
In 2021, he helped form “The Alliance,” a de facto governance block with the ACC and Pac-12 in response to the SEC adding Oklahoma and Texas as future members. The Alliance was supposedly troubled by conference expansion (foreshadowing alert) but it’s only tangible accomplishment was torpedoing an expanded playoff plan because it was designed, in part, by SEC commissioner Greg Sankey.
The Alliance was decimated by Warren’s own expansion raid of Pac-12, a claimed partner, in 2022. Warren brought UCLA and USC into the Big Ten. This forever changed the fabric and the level of trust within the sport.
The Big Ten quickly secured a huge media rights deal. With the league stronger and the competitor weaker, playoff expansion was back on the table.
And now, in classic modern college sports fashion, he’s hit the transfer portal for what is perceived to be a better opportunity (president and CEO of the Chicago Bears) because it might lead to the mother of all NIL deals — commissioner of the NFL and its $60-million plus salary.
You can leave a lot behind.
The NCAA convention is currently being held in San Antonio and the most popular buzzword from regulation-obsessed administrators is “guardrails,” or the need for some kind of rules to limit athletes from transferring or making money or who knows what. They claim that everything is a threat to college athletics’ sanctity. It’s mostly people who fear change.
Warren was right. No amount of linebackers vying for playing time or a few more dollars can change the fabric college sports like Warren did. The players do not follow the orders of their boss and are ruthlessly watching out for their best interest.
Now he’s gone and everyone else can figure out what to do with the results — be they positive, negative or simply different.
His greatest critics must admit that Warren was decisive in ways no one expected. He was hired as a little-known outsider — he’d played some college basketball and worked as a lawyer on some infractions cases, but his experience was in the NFL.
Many figured he’d take time to learn the lay of the land. Instead, the now-59-year-old rewrote everything and then bailed at his first chance.
Initial questions were raised about his competence after a botched COVID cancellation scheme. No, it wasn’t all his idea, but it looked increasingly ridiculous as football was safely played in other parts of the country, not to mention the NFL.
He didn’t let his start paralyze him, but he bulldozed through everybody. The Big Ten has become more powerful and richer than ever. It is also unique, which may or not impact it in ways nobody can predict. Are there two LA schools in an once Midwestern league It could be amazing. But it could also be boring. In any case, everyone became rich.
The Pac-12, who foolishly believed him, is now trying to get back on its feet and become a smaller and less wealthy entity. Due to a poor long-term media agreement, the ACC continues to fall behind monetarily. If there is one No. 1 candidate to replace Warren in the Big Ten, it’s current ACC commissioner Jim Phillips, who used to be the athletic director at Northwestern.
Even though some in the corner office may be against the idea of a portal for transfer to the corner office, it might not happen.
Warren placed the Big Ten in a Big Two/Dueling Super Powers position with the SEC in college football. This is what pays the bills for college athletics. Everyone else is trying to find relevance, revenue and competitive hopes. He earned more than the league paid him.
Kevin Warren was the one who mastered all the complaints about tampering and money-driven transfers, as well as the bottom line decisions regarding how rosters are made. His entire tenure was back-channel deals and broken hand shakes, which isn’t a criticism, just a nod to reality. He abandoned the pretense of being nice and played everyone for what he and his league felt was necessary.
This was business. He was not contained by any guardrails.
Now he’ll try to solve the Bears stadium issues and perhaps rebuild the franchise into an on-field winner. He could eventually succeed Roger Goodell.
Three and a half years — not even a full traditional college career — after arriving in the college game, he’s declared for the pros.
His impact on the world will last a lifetime in many ways.