CHICAGO, IL – Jim Delany took the podium at the Hilton Chicago in downtown on Thursday morning for what will mark his final B1G Ten Football Media Day. After 31 years as commissioner, he will pass the torch on to Kevin Warren as the 6th commissioner of the league officially on January 1st, 2020.
Mr. Delany opened up the morning taking a moment to say a few words of praise for Warren, setting B1G Ten Athletics up for success for the future.
“Kevin is a smart, experienced executive, lots of NFL, and legal experience. He’s also a former student-athlete. He’s a parent of a couple student-athletes. But importantly, just based on my short interaction with Kevin and talking to the other people who know him well, your sixth commissioner of the Big Ten is going to be a great leader for this conference.”
Warren comes to the B1G Ten after being the COO for the Minnesota Vikings, and was the first African-American COO of an NFL team, as hired in 2015.
Getting back to the event, Delany kicked off the morning thanking the member of the media. “ You’ve been working in an evolving and changing environment. You’ve had to adjust and adapt. And I just want to recognize you for what you’ve done for intercollegiate athletics, for the Conference, and for the institutions that provide the opportunities for 10,000 young people every year.”
After thanking the media, he turned to focus on a big point of emphasis on gender quality. Stating that over his time in the conference on the league’s ability to make a significant stance on gender equality.
“I’m particularly proud of the fact that in 1989 we had a lot of progress to make, and we’ve made that progress. We were 75 percent male, 25 percent female. We set upon a course and an action, purposeful, and today we’re roughly 50/50, depending upon the year that you’re measuring. But these are best-in-class educational opportunities in the classroom and on the fields and courts. I’m excited that I was part of that change, and I worked with many others to make it happen.”
In concerns to health, Mr. Delany was very proud of what the B1G Ten has been able to do in terms of the concussion protocol. The B1G Ten was instrumental in the start of implementing concussion protocols in major FBS football.
“But one of the areas that I think will be with us for years to come is the health and safety of our students. We were the first conference to adopt a concussion management plan. And about nine years ago, I was having a conversation with one of our faculty members out at the Rose Bowl, Chris Saley, she was a scientist at Purdue. And we started brainstorming and talking about the possibility of creating a summit in and around researchers and clinicians to help study the brain.”
From this conversation, one of the big things done was the start of the concussion summit. The B1G Ten Academic Alliance and Ivy League joined together in 2012 to start the ball rolling in researching TBI issues. In fact, their summit just wrapped up on Wednesday in Rosemont, Illinois.
“And there’s not a whole lot of longitudinal information about this issue, and yesterday we celebrated our seventh summit. We’ve collaborated with the Ivy League and its eight institutions, 14 of our own institutions. We had 150 clinicians and researchers come together. And it’s just truly remarkable to see what a college athletic conference can do when it’s made up of such amazing research institutions and collaborating with others to move that needle forward.”
After this, he took a final moment to thank his family before fielding questions from the media.
A highlight of the questions asked was one issue that he wished he had gotten done but failed to do during his time. It concerned freshmen ineligibility and a laundry allowance that was done away with back in the ’70s.
“I think we made some real serious mistakes in the ’70s that have come to create problems for us. I think one was the loss of the four-year scholarship. One was the loss of the $15 a month for laundry, and the other was the loss of freshman ineligibility.”
As a continued topic that arises in these sessions, the media was quick to bring up the College Football Playoff. With the Big Ten being in only two of the five total College Football Playoff’s, the main issue that Mr. Delany brought up was the emphasis strength of schedule. His thought was that it hasn’t seemed to be considered as much as he would like.
“The actual language in the founding document says, “when comparing teams with similar records and similar resumes, should look at strength of schedule as well as winning conference championships.”
“I’ll leave it to each individual to see whether or not you believe they have. Clearly, Alabama and Clemson have separated themselves, and they have deserved everything that they’ve earned in the last couple years. But I’m not sure that the strength of schedule or the conference championship has been adequately rewarded, in my personal view.”
As Delany winds down his tenure as the Big Ten commissioner, he will work alongside Kevin Warren as the league transitions to a new era. Warren will become the first African-American commissioner of a Power Five conference and will officially start with the B1G Ten on September 16th of 2019, with Delany making his exit on January 1st of 2020.
Written by Adrian Beecher
Image Credit: Nick Windsor
