COLUMBUS — New Ohio State athletic director Ross Bjork’s path to one of the top jobs in college sports did not begin in northwest Ohio.
But it did pass through.
While Bjork came of age in Dodge City, Kan., his mom, Linda, grew up in Williamstown, just south of Findlay, on a farm where Woody ranked behind only God and family. He heard the gospel on his many childhood trips to Ohio, including from Uncle Vernon.
“He was the Pied Piper always talking about Ohio State,” Bjork said. “Growing up, it was always viewed as this mystical thing: Columbus! Ohio State! You’d always talk about them, but it was never within reach, if you will.”
Funny how life works out.
Today, Bjork is back in Ohio, with plans to stay a while this time.
After a steady climb that included stops as the AD at Western Kentucky, Mississippi, and Texas A&M, he has reached his mystical destination.
Bjork is succeeding the retiring Gene Smith at Ohio State, where he will guide the nation’s biggest and richest athletic department — with 36 varsity sports and a budget north of $230 million — through the ongoing sea changes of the times.
He was appointed earlier this year and his first official day was July 1.
I sat down with Bjork this week in his new digs on the top floor of the Fawcett Center — overlooking the Buckeyes’ palatial football complex — and he graciously took time to dish on everything from his family’s nearby roots to where Ohio State and college athletics are headed. Here’s the Q and A, lightly edited and condensed for clarity:
Q: How did your family’s northwest Ohio ties shape your perspective on Ohio State?
A: We visited Ohio all the time. At least once a year, whether it was a summer trip or Thanksgiving or Christmas, we came in one way, shape, or form … and Ohio State was always around the family, the conversation.
I remember the first game I attended at Ohio Stadium, in 1998, when I worked at Missouri. I was a young fund-raising person and Missouri and Ohio State had the home-and-home series. I was sitting in the old wooden chairs right around the track, and you literally had to take a chair and put it in the aisleway. I was the biggest fire hazard ever.
I just remember thinking, ‘Oh my God, I'm at Ohio Stadium.’ I had all my family ask for tickets. I said, ‘You can come, but you have to wear Missouri stuff.’
Q: The Big Ten and SEC — and the Big Four conferences — are clearly driving the bus, but you didn’t start at the top. You played football at Emporia State and got your first AD job at Western Kentucky. What role do MAC schools like Toledo and Bowling Green play in the future D-I ecosystem? Do you support their continued access to the College Football Playoff?
A: There's a place for everybody, and what we need to figure out is what is the right place. … What we've done is create a brand association that's led to economic challenges, meaning, when I was at Western Kentucky, we made sure we said we were a BCS conference program. Technically, we were, because we were part of the Sun Belt, which had access to the BCS. But the likelihood [of making a BCS game] was minimal, so we've been chasing this sort of optical trophy at other levels, saying, ‘Hey, we have to be like Ohio State.’
Perhaps we need to rethink that, and say, ‘Hey, look, there's a place for everybody.’ It doesn't mean we won’t play each other, but how do we come to this spot where they can chase something and we can chase something based on the economic realities of where we are. … We need to work at the NCAA level to figure out more of a sort of demarcation within Division I and what that means. If we do the work and we're purposeful about it, that's where Toledo and Bowling Green, that's where they can thrive, because those are great programs.
Q: Specifically, should Group of Five schools continue to have a guaranteed spot in the playoff?
A: I think they should, yes. That’s a healthy way to do it, given the current model. But I also know some of my good friends have put out there that we should have another playoff system for the G5. There's value in content. People want live sports content. People want championship content. The FCS playoffs, you watch them and they're awesome. Could there be another layer to the whole ecosystem of postseason football? Yeah, I think there could be.
Q: You’ve been part of some great rivalries. Forgive this very leading question, but what makes Ohio State-Michigan the greatest rivalry? How have you felt the magnitude of it since you’ve been here?
A: Being around Ohio and family, you always heard about the game, and that game was always going to be on ABC … Keith Jackson. As a fan, you always understood the magnitude of that game. Then as TV ratings became prevalent, every year, it's the highest TV rating. [You have] two stadiums holding over 100,000 people, close proximity, bordering states, all of those elements play into it. … You look at history, there's always been; ‘What's Ohio State going to do against that team?’ We understand that. We embrace that. Coach [Ryan] Day gets it. And the intensity has heated up lately, based on whether it's personalities, competitiveness, national championship pursuits, recruiting battles, all those kinds of things …
Q: Scandals …
A: … Controversies.. I can say I wasn’t there. I have a fresh perspective. But all of those things have amped up the intensity.
Q: On the topic, there’s a concern that — with the Big Ten eliminating divisions — Ohio State and Michigan could now play on back-to-back weeks: in the final game of the regular season and the conference championship game. Could it make sense to move the game to an earlier date? Or is it too iconic where it is at the end of the regular season?
A: I think it's too iconic. If it ever gets hung up in those dynamics, you'd look at it. But there would have to be a lot to play out in order to move off that last weekend.
Q: I wonder if some are looking at this the wrong way. Why are we asking how Ohio State-Michigan might work around the conference title game, not the other way around? Especially now that we have a 12-team playoff, does the Big Ten still need a title game? Yes, it’s valuable, but not nearly as valuable as OSU-UM. Why mess with — and devalue — your biggest property?
A: I think that has to all be on the table. Look, we don't know the playability of having 16 or 17 games. That's never happened before in college football. What's going to be the toll on the roster? … As things evolve, all those playability and player-safety issues need to be put on the table, but it all comes down to value. What kind of value are we producing that would allow you not to have a championship game? That's just not on the table yet.
Q: You’ve mentioned how you're reading a lot about Ohio State history — and seeing history repeat itself with some of the same pressures and issues. It’s funny to think: In 1950, Ohio State AD Dick Larkins worried that college football had gotten “too big for its britches.” “It’s getting completely out of hand,” he said. “It’s a Frankenstein, a monster.” Was he more prescient than he could have known?
A: That's a good point. It's really fascinating when you see those comments made in the 1950s or even the early 1900s. There's a lot of the same issues. There's a lot of money in the system, there's commercialization, coaches are making a lot of money. Back then, it was relative, but the numbers were big compared to faculty salaries. There's another report that came out in 1957. Ohio State got put on probation. They were offering money to players. … There was a Professor Fullington who came out with a report that basically said it’s time to recognize that the athletes should receive a piece of the economics that benefit Ohio State. In 1957 they say this. What are we doing now?
Q: Speaking of that, as college athletics moves toward a revenue-sharing model, Ohio State has committed to distribute the max allowable amount (about $22 million per year) to its athletes. In the past, a lot of that money would have gone to fund the non-revenue sports. Can Ohio State continue to sponsor 36 varsity scholarship programs?
A: We will support 36 sports. But the key word you added there was scholarship sports. What does that look like? I would sit here today and tell you we're committed to 36 sports. The economics are what they are — $22 million is a big number. Now, we do have incremental revenues that can offset some of that. A new TV contract, CFP money. We don't have to cover the full gap. But there will be a pretty big gap. So what we have to do is answer a lot of questions. What do scholarships look like moving forward? What sports receive revenue sharing based on roster sizes and Title IX? … Those are all things we're modeling.
Q: How excited are you for this football season? What do you think when you hear someone like Urban Meyer say this is the one of the most talented rosters he’s ‘maybe ever’seen? Do you wince? Or do you embrace those expectations?
A: When you put your name on an Ohio State contract, when you sign up to work here, if you don't embrace those expectations and it's not part of your DNA, it's just not going to last long. … When you hear those comments, you could maybe say that about Ohio State every year, every other year. This year, it's highlighted by some really key additions and kind of a rebuild, if you will, of the mentality after the last couple years. It’s magnified this year. … We know what the expectations are. It doesn't matter who says it. Those are built in. We get it.
And I’ve really been impressed with coach Day. He’s really focused on the leadership and the culture and these intangible pieces. Drown out the noise, let's focus on who we are, control what we can control. I went out to football workouts just to get a vibe of what's happening this summer and there's a chip there. They are working, and the best part is you didn't hear a lot of strength coaches yelling. The players are the ones going, “Hey now, get in line here.’ ‘Hey, you didn’t touch the line.’ ‘Hey, you need to run that again.’ I was really impressed. When a team is player led, it can be magical.
“Look, I'm a football guy. I love football Saturdays. I love competition. You love winning on the road where it's hostile. You love seeing the guys smile after the game. I'm just looking forward to all those moments, especially here. And I know the expectations.
Q: Your first big hire was one of northwest Ohio’s own, new basketball coach Jake Diebler. What impresses you about Jake?
A : I’ve been really impressed with his maturity level and professionalism. … And then recruiting wise, we are in the game. We are in the game at a high level, and that’s what you have to be. We've been able to close on a couple guys. The energy, the excitement, the relatability, I knew that was there, but … it's only validated the decision watching him in action. It's been fun.
Q: It’s been noted that Jim Tressel and Urban Meyer had relatives on their staff. Why was Jake not allowed to hire his brother, Jon, as an assistant coach? ( Jon is a former Buckeyes star and an assistant at Butler.)
A: There have been some things that have changed around the state ethics laws around nepotism. That's what it is. It wasn't an Ohio State policy. We took this all the way to the state. Because Jake is in charge as the head coach and he has direct [oversight] responsibilities, we looked at all kinds of models, and it just wouldn't pass the test. A lot of those things have evolved.
Q: One more basketball question. Expansion of the NCAA tournament seems inevitable, but is there a risk of diminishing the magic of what makes March Madness so special?
A: Look, I was at a program where we had a losing record and we won the conference tournament and we got in at Western Kentucky. It was awesome. It was a fun run. … But the programs that are investing, the programs that are winning at a high level, we’re at the mercy of a system that may not be quite fair because of the [automatic qualifier] process.
[You want] the Cinderella stories. We want that. I just think that giving more opportunities and more content is what people want. TV partners want more content, and if you expand the tournament, you add more games.
Q: Do you think people want a bigger tournament? Fans, I mean?
A: Oh, yeah, I think so. I think so. People want more live sports content. The value of live sports content, especially in college athletics … we hear all these conversations about how we’re undervalued. OK, if that's the case, let's give more content out there and let's drive this value proposition that we keep talking about. I think there's a window. Do you have to get too big? No.
Q: Toledo is currently shopping the naming rights to the Glass Bowl, and now schools can begin putting corporate patches on uniforms and sponsor logos on fields and courts. At Ohio State, how do you strike the balance between preserving tradition and exploring new revenue opportunities?
A: I always think of a phrase: Let’s make sure we protect tradition, but not think traditionally. How do we sort of take that ideal and monetize it, commercialize it in the right way, yet know that we have this economic engine that we have to feed, and it's only going to grow and we're only going to have to find more [revenue]? There’s always a tasteful way that you can integrate sponsors — commercialization, if you will — where it’s not putting it in everybody’s face.
Always protect tradition, but don't think traditionally about innovation and modernization. And I think you just have to be transparent and say, ‘Hey, we're in a revenue-based enterprise, now more than ever. If we're going to kind of peel away Band-Aids, let's start ripping them off sooner rather than later and get to a place where we're transparent about everything. We state our case, we honor tradition, knowing that we have this economic engine that's not going to slow down.
Q: Could there ever be a tasteful manner to sell the naming rights to Ohio Stadium?
A: Maybe. Maybe. Yeah, obviously, there's a lot of historic value in that and what that means. If you go back to how they raised the money to build the stadium, every county contributed, and they did not want to take away from state dollars or tuition dollars. If that ever has to get put on the table, it's the same conversation. At this point in time, you can never say never on anything. You have to put everything on the table, and then you evaluate it and make the best decision for the institution.
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