At Globe Summit, NCAA president Charlie Baker discusses his position and the state of collegiate athletics

Faculty Sports activities

Baker made clear the NCAA’s understanding of its place within the social media age, when younger folks can construct a model and an affect on-line.

By Amin Touri, The Boston Globe

September 21, 2023 | 6:00 AM

The pipeline from high-level Massachusetts politics to high-level sports activities management has grow to be a powerful one lately.

Charlie Baker and Marty Walsh have been shut colleagues for a number of years of their respective tenures as governor of Massachusetts and mayor of Boston, and now they improbably discover themselves each in sports activities positions, Baker as president of the NCAA and Walsh as government director of the NHL Gamers Affiliation.

That pathway was a topic of debate at Wednesday’s characteristic occasion on the Globe Summit, the place Baker mentioned his position at a pivotal time in collegiate athletics, with convention realignment, the switch portal, and NIL guidelines radically shifting the panorama.

Walsh’s path to the sports activities business was a bit extra simple than Baker’s, having been tapped by President Joe Biden for a cupboard place as Secretary of Labor, a job he swapped for a task largely outlined by labor negotiations with the NHLPA.

Baker’s bounce to the NCAA, pushed by Crimson Sox CEO Sam Kennedy, was a bit extra shocking. However between government management at a macro degree, and balancing dozens of conferences, a whole lot of committees, and greater than a thousand member faculties, Baker’s new gig does bear some similarities to his outdated one.

“My willingness to work in that sort of setting seems to be rather a lot just like the one I got here out of, the place you have got legislators and native officers and advocates and plenty of stuff coming at you from one million instructions on a regular basis,” Baker stated.

“Being in an setting like that’s acquainted. I believe, greater than something, it must be that I’ll discover methods to create what I’d describe as frequent floor, and get us to the place the place we make selections earlier than issues occur versus reacting and responding when one thing occurs.”

Baker made clear the group’s understanding of its place within the social media age, when younger folks can construct a model and an affect on-line. He takes no problem with that; the priority is how Title-Picture-Likeness guidelines have been applied.

“The priority I’ve about the way in which it really works now’s that there’s no framework and no transparency and no accountability,” Baker stated. “I imply, it’s just about unattainable for a student-athlete or their household to know if what somebody is telling them is true or not — an agent, a rep — and that bothers me.

“It’s arduous to inform what the market worth seems to be like, it’s actually arduous to inform. If somebody says, ‘I’ve completed this for 5 – 6 different youngsters,’ no person is aware of. And I’ve talked to student-athletes which have stated to me their concern about this factor is that they simply don’t know who to imagine.”

Baker was requested in regards to the distinction between his private recognition as governor — he persistently polled as one of the vital well-liked governors within the nation all through his time period — and the wide-ranging unpopularity of the group he now presides over.

For Baker, progress on that entrance started with a state-of-the-business evaluation and conferences with all 97 conferences to listen to grievances and kick-start conversations about the way forward for collegiate athletics.

“I’m going to satisfy with all of them, yearly, and do the perfect we are able to to be student-athlete-focused, and likewise considerably forward-looking,” Baker stated. “If we try this, and we do it nicely, and we implement the holistic student-athlete mannequin and the insurance coverage harm safety program and a few of these different issues, we are able to work on the model.

“However I’ve at all times felt, when you’ve got points along with your model, you possibly can’t blame that in your comms folks. That’s not your comms folks. They’ll solely work with what they’ve. And it’s as much as us to determine a technique to persuade folks it is a totally different NCAA.”

Whereas Baker’s new position entails loads of the politicking and paperwork he handled on Beacon Hill, it does have its perks. He highlighted final month’s occasion at Nebraska, the place the ladies’s volleyball crew performed in entrance of 92,000 followers, a second that gave him goosebumps.

“That was mind-boggling, it actually was,” Baker stated. “Look, I performed sports activities, my spouse performed sports activities, my youngsters play sports activities; I like watching youngsters play sports activities, I simply like it.

“I’ve met most likely a thousand student-athletes, and for all of the noise that reveals up on social media, these face-to-face moments I get to spend with student-athletes once I go to campuses for one factor or one other, that’s the place I get what I might name the constructive vibe in regards to the future.”