Tim Benz: Heather Lyke's dismissal at Pitt is a case of what we don't bother to see in the NIL era

When it comes to roster construction for the four major North American pro sports, we care about the process.

We care about free agency, trades and drafts. We care about who the general managers are and how they go about procuring talent.

On the college sports level, it’s a lot more along the lines of, “ Don’t tell me how the sausage is made. Just put it on my pizza. ”

I don’t think that a lot of college sports fans — especially those in a pro sports town such as Pittsburgh — really care about how the student-athletes get on campus. They just care that they get here and perform.

I’m not talking about following recruiting message boards and tracking social media for letters of intent. Sure, lots of college sports fans do that. That’s all part of the hype.

I’m talking about closing the deal. I’m talking about how and why the players come to campus.

Whether that was in 1974 when a big duffel bag full of money might have wound up on some kid’s back porch, or like in the movie “Blue Chips” when Ricky Roe’s dad got a tractor in 1994, or in 2024 when a promising running back winds up with a perfectly legal, NCAA-approved NIL marketing deal.

No one cares how they arrive. Just get ‘em here and make sure they play well, as we pay good money to sit in a big building and cheer them on.

Well, that “how the sausage is made” issue is why Heather Lyke is out as Pitt’s athletic director. She was fired Monday by chancellor Joan Gabel.

• Half the class being injured doesn’t dampen solid NFL debut for Steelers rookies who did play

• Steelers bring back punter Corliss Waitman after Cameron Johnston season-ending injury

• Penguins' Sidney Crosby 'pretty optimistic' he'll sign contract extension soon

A key issue was about Lyke’s plan to fully embrace and effectively stream NIL fundraising and distribution. This is to say: According to people who have covered the news of her firing on Monday, she didn’t have much of a plan to speak of in the first place.

It’s the $240 million Victory Heights project for Olympic sports that, as of April 2023, only had $12 million raised.

It’s her relationship with the chancellor which was said to be rough (at best) by the end. It was relationships with some on the staff where Lyke could come off as demanding and lean extremely hard on those who were much further down the totem pole of the payroll.

It was her apparent interest in just about every open job under the sun associated with a bigger school or a better conference.

It wasn’t what we all saw in terms of wins and losses. The hiring of Jeff Capel III. Overseeing a football program that won an ACC Championship. Being in charge of the athletics program as its women’s volleyball team ascended to the Final Four.

Apparently, it was bad enough behind the gains that the chancellor couldn’t even keep Lyke around for another week. That’s a move that would’ve made a lot of sense, given that the Backyard Brawl is happening at Acrisure Stadium on Saturday, the school’s Hall of Fame inductions are occurring this week, the volleyball team just got ranked No. 1 in the country for the first time ever, and the football team just scored an impressive comeback win over Cincinnati on Saturday.

Yet, all of those good vibe storylines are now dwarfed by the fact that the school just canned the person who had been leading the athletics program.

The timing is, to say the least, odd. It’s like Pitt is a real estate agent saying, “ Hey, this house looks pretty good on the outside. But, pfft, guess what’s going on inside! ”

As Gabel said in her press release announcing Lyke’s dismissal, “As we enter a new era in college athletics, one that seems to change by the day, we need a new vision and a new leader of our athletics department.”

In other words, they need someone who knows how to make the sausage — even if the recipe is much different now than it was in 2017 when Lyke was hired.

LISTEN: Tim Benz and Jerry DiPaola discuss Pitt’s firing of Heather Lyke and the upcoming Backyard Brawl.