Scott McClurg/Journal-World PhotoPrinceton, N.J. ? Gene Budig was headed up in the elevator at Princeton’s Jadwin Gymnasium when the door opened and in stepped Drew Gooden, dressed in his pre-game warm-ups. Introduced to Gooden as a former Kansas University chancellor, Budig stuck out his mitt and asked Gooden if he had ever had any classes in Budig Hall.
“Yeah, sure,” Gooden replied, smiling when informed he was riding in the same elevator with the namesake of that familiar Mount Oread structure.
Budig, KU’s chancellor from 1981 to 1994, was making the rounds Wednesday night, visiting with the media, chatting with new KU athletics director Al Bohl, saying hi to former KU basketball coach Larry Brown, sitting with former KU athletics director Bob Frederick a house guest and acknowledging just about everyone else who walked into the Princeton gym wearing Jayhawk paraphernalia.
When he isn’t commuting to New York City to serve as an advisor to baseball commissioner Bud Selig or serving as a visiting scholar with the American College Boards in midtown Manhattan, Budig teaches a course called “The Business of Sport in the Public Trust” at Princeton a very easy commute because he and his wife, Gretchen, live adjacent to the Ivy League school’s campus.
Budig’s ties to Princeton and Kansas are so well known he was the subject of a feature story in the program for Wednesday night’s clash between the Jayhawks and Tigers. Asked who he would be rooting for, Budig stated flatly: “I’ll be rooting for the Jayhawks. I’m a Jayhawk fan.” The story’s headline, in fact, read: “Rock Chalk, He’s Still a Jayhawk.”
While remaining a KU fan, Budig apparently also is one of the top-rated professors on the Princeton campus. Or so he told me. Then again, he may have been speaking tongue-in-cheek Budig’s humor is drier than Death Valley but I decided it was incumbent upon me as a member of the Fourth Estate to determine just what kind of a professor Budig is. To tell the truth, I have a tough time envisioning him carrying a three-hour class every Monday afternoon for a semester.
“Usually, he doesn’t lecture,” a student named Josh Fien-Helfman told me. “He brings in these incredible sports personalities, then he’ll usually sum up for 30 minutes or an hour after they’re finished.”
Budig has lured to Princeton the commissioners of three major pro leagues Selig, of course, and David Stern of the NBA and Gary Bettman of the NHL. OK, so he hasn’t had Paul Tagliabue, commissioner of the NFL. Nobody’s perfect. Budig has also brought to town a handful of owners of professional sports teams such as Stan Kasten, who owns the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks.
Fien-Helfman, a senior from Washington, D.C., who is majoring in economics but says his father would really like for him to be a sports writer I picked myself up off the floor after he uttered those words) sounded like he was disappointed the classroom portion had ended on Monday.
“I’ve really learned a lot,” Fien-Helfman said. “He (Budig) also talks about the colleges and the things that go on with money and recruiting. I’ve also learned that competitive balance in a big problem, that sports is big business and not always profitable. It feels like I’m in a current events class.”
Fien-Helfman, nevertheless, will not devote his term paper to professional sports. He says he will write it from the perspective of being president of the NCAA. He’ll make a proposal, he said, that involves more equitable distribution of money while at the same time equating how much money student-athletes produce for the nation’s athletic departments and if they should be recompensed.
I don’t know if Fien-Helfman will come up with anything innovative gosh knows college athletics and amateurism have been hashed and rehashed forever but it’s nice to know people with Ivy League intelligence are tackling it. And for that we can thank Gene Budig.
Scott McClurg/Journal-World PhotoPrinceton, N.J. ? Gene Budig was headed up in the elevator at Princeton’s Jadwin Gymnasium when the door opened and in stepped Drew Gooden, dressed in his pre-game warm-ups. Introduced to Gooden as a former Kansas University chancellor, Budig stuck out his mitt and asked Gooden if he had ever had any classes in Budig Hall.
“Yeah, sure,” Gooden replied, smiling when informed he was riding in the same elevator with the namesake of that familiar Mount Oread structure.
Budig, KU’s chancellor from 1981 to 1994, was making the rounds Wednesday night, visiting with the media, chatting with new KU athletics director Al Bohl, saying hi to former KU basketball coach Larry Brown, sitting with former KU athletics director Bob Frederick a house guest and acknowledging just about everyone else who walked into the Princeton gym wearing Jayhawk paraphernalia.
When he isn’t commuting to New York City to serve as an advisor to baseball commissioner Bud Selig or serving as a visiting scholar with the American College Boards in midtown Manhattan, Budig teaches a course called “The Business of Sport in the Public Trust” at Princeton a very easy commute because he and his wife, Gretchen, live adjacent to the Ivy League school’s campus.
Budig’s ties to Princeton and Kansas are so well known he was the subject of a feature story in the program for Wednesday night’s clash between the Jayhawks and Tigers. Asked who he would be rooting for, Budig stated flatly: “I’ll be rooting for the Jayhawks. I’m a Jayhawk fan.” The story’s headline, in fact, read: “Rock Chalk, He’s Still a Jayhawk.”
While remaining a KU fan, Budig apparently also is one of the top-rated professors on the Princeton campus. Or so he told me. Then again, he may have been speaking tongue-in-cheek Budig’s humor is drier than Death Valley but I decided it was incumbent upon me as a member of the Fourth Estate to determine just what kind of a professor Budig is. To tell the truth, I have a tough time envisioning him carrying a three-hour class every Monday afternoon for a semester.
“Usually, he doesn’t lecture,” a student named Josh Fien-Helfman told me. “He brings in these incredible sports personalities, then he’ll usually sum up for 30 minutes or an hour after they’re finished.”
Budig has lured to Princeton the commissioners of three major pro leagues Selig, of course, and David Stern of the NBA and Gary Bettman of the NHL. OK, so he hasn’t had Paul Tagliabue, commissioner of the NFL. Nobody’s perfect. Budig has also brought to town a handful of owners of professional sports teams such as Stan Kasten, who owns the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks.
Fien-Helfman, a senior from Washington, D.C., who is majoring in economics but says his father would really like for him to be a sports writer I picked myself up off the floor after he uttered those words) sounded like he was disappointed the classroom portion had ended on Monday.
“I’ve really learned a lot,” Fien-Helfman said. “He (Budig) also talks about the colleges and the things that go on with money and recruiting. I’ve also learned that competitive balance in a big problem, that sports is big business and not always profitable. It feels like I’m in a current events class.”
Fien-Helfman, nevertheless, will not devote his term paper to professional sports. He says he will write it from the perspective of being president of the NCAA. He’ll make a proposal, he said, that involves more equitable distribution of money while at the same time equating how much money student-athletes produce for the nation’s athletic departments and if they should be recompensed.
I don’t know if Fien-Helfman will come up with anything innovative gosh knows college athletics and amateurism have been hashed and rehashed forever but it’s nice to know people with Ivy League intelligence are tackling it. And for that we can thank Gene Budig.
Scott McClurg/Journal-World PhotoPrinceton, N.J. ? Gene Budig was headed up in the elevator at Princeton’s Jadwin Gymnasium when the door opened and in stepped Drew Gooden, dressed in his pre-game warm-ups. Introduced to Gooden as a former Kansas University chancellor, Budig stuck out his mitt and asked Gooden if he had ever had any classes in Budig Hall.
“Yeah, sure,” Gooden replied, smiling when informed he was riding in the same elevator with the namesake of that familiar Mount Oread structure.
Budig, KU’s chancellor from 1981 to 1994, was making the rounds Wednesday night, visiting with the media, chatting with new KU athletics director Al Bohl, saying hi to former KU basketball coach Larry Brown, sitting with former KU athletics director Bob Frederick a house guest and acknowledging just about everyone else who walked into the Princeton gym wearing Jayhawk paraphernalia.
When he isn’t commuting to New York City to serve as an advisor to baseball commissioner Bud Selig or serving as a visiting scholar with the American College Boards in midtown Manhattan, Budig teaches a course called “The Business of Sport in the Public Trust” at Princeton a very easy commute because he and his wife, Gretchen, live adjacent to the Ivy League school’s campus.
Budig’s ties to Princeton and Kansas are so well known he was the subject of a feature story in the program for Wednesday night’s clash between the Jayhawks and Tigers. Asked who he would be rooting for, Budig stated flatly: “I’ll be rooting for the Jayhawks. I’m a Jayhawk fan.” The story’s headline, in fact, read: “Rock Chalk, He’s Still a Jayhawk.”
While remaining a KU fan, Budig apparently also is one of the top-rated professors on the Princeton campus. Or so he told me. Then again, he may have been speaking tongue-in-cheek Budig’s humor is drier than Death Valley but I decided it was incumbent upon me as a member of the Fourth Estate to determine just what kind of a professor Budig is. To tell the truth, I have a tough time envisioning him carrying a three-hour class every Monday afternoon for a semester.
“Usually, he doesn’t lecture,” a student named Josh Fien-Helfman told me. “He brings in these incredible sports personalities, then he’ll usually sum up for 30 minutes or an hour after they’re finished.”
Budig has lured to Princeton the commissioners of three major pro leagues Selig, of course, and David Stern of the NBA and Gary Bettman of the NHL. OK, so he hasn’t had Paul Tagliabue, commissioner of the NFL. Nobody’s perfect. Budig has also brought to town a handful of owners of professional sports teams such as Stan Kasten, who owns the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks.
Fien-Helfman, a senior from Washington, D.C., who is majoring in economics but says his father would really like for him to be a sports writer I picked myself up off the floor after he uttered those words) sounded like he was disappointed the classroom portion had ended on Monday.
“I’ve really learned a lot,” Fien-Helfman said. “He (Budig) also talks about the colleges and the things that go on with money and recruiting. I’ve also learned that competitive balance in a big problem, that sports is big business and not always profitable. It feels like I’m in a current events class.”
Fien-Helfman, nevertheless, will not devote his term paper to professional sports. He says he will write it from the perspective of being president of the NCAA. He’ll make a proposal, he said, that involves more equitable distribution of money while at the same time equating how much money student-athletes produce for the nation’s athletic departments and if they should be recompensed.
I don’t know if Fien-Helfman will come up with anything innovative gosh knows college athletics and amateurism have been hashed and rehashed forever but it’s nice to know people with Ivy League intelligence are tackling it. And for that we can thank Gene Budig.
Scott McClurg/Journal-World PhotoPrinceton, N.J. ? Gene Budig was headed up in the elevator at Princeton’s Jadwin Gymnasium when the door opened and in stepped Drew Gooden, dressed in his pre-game warm-ups. Introduced to Gooden as a former Kansas University chancellor, Budig stuck out his mitt and asked Gooden if he had ever had any classes in Budig Hall.
“Yeah, sure,” Gooden replied, smiling when informed he was riding in the same elevator with the namesake of that familiar Mount Oread structure.
Budig, KU’s chancellor from 1981 to 1994, was making the rounds Wednesday night, visiting with the media, chatting with new KU athletics director Al Bohl, saying hi to former KU basketball coach Larry Brown, sitting with former KU athletics director Bob Frederick a house guest and acknowledging just about everyone else who walked into the Princeton gym wearing Jayhawk paraphernalia.
When he isn’t commuting to New York City to serve as an advisor to baseball commissioner Bud Selig or serving as a visiting scholar with the American College Boards in midtown Manhattan, Budig teaches a course called “The Business of Sport in the Public Trust” at Princeton a very easy commute because he and his wife, Gretchen, live adjacent to the Ivy League school’s campus.
Budig’s ties to Princeton and Kansas are so well known he was the subject of a feature story in the program for Wednesday night’s clash between the Jayhawks and Tigers. Asked who he would be rooting for, Budig stated flatly: “I’ll be rooting for the Jayhawks. I’m a Jayhawk fan.” The story’s headline, in fact, read: “Rock Chalk, He’s Still a Jayhawk.”
While remaining a KU fan, Budig apparently also is one of the top-rated professors on the Princeton campus. Or so he told me. Then again, he may have been speaking tongue-in-cheek Budig’s humor is drier than Death Valley but I decided it was incumbent upon me as a member of the Fourth Estate to determine just what kind of a professor Budig is. To tell the truth, I have a tough time envisioning him carrying a three-hour class every Monday afternoon for a semester.
“Usually, he doesn’t lecture,” a student named Josh Fien-Helfman told me. “He brings in these incredible sports personalities, then he’ll usually sum up for 30 minutes or an hour after they’re finished.”
Budig has lured to Princeton the commissioners of three major pro leagues Selig, of course, and David Stern of the NBA and Gary Bettman of the NHL. OK, so he hasn’t had Paul Tagliabue, commissioner of the NFL. Nobody’s perfect. Budig has also brought to town a handful of owners of professional sports teams such as Stan Kasten, who owns the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks.
Fien-Helfman, a senior from Washington, D.C., who is majoring in economics but says his father would really like for him to be a sports writer I picked myself up off the floor after he uttered those words) sounded like he was disappointed the classroom portion had ended on Monday.
“I’ve really learned a lot,” Fien-Helfman said. “He (Budig) also talks about the colleges and the things that go on with money and recruiting. I’ve also learned that competitive balance in a big problem, that sports is big business and not always profitable. It feels like I’m in a current events class.”
Fien-Helfman, nevertheless, will not devote his term paper to professional sports. He says he will write it from the perspective of being president of the NCAA. He’ll make a proposal, he said, that involves more equitable distribution of money while at the same time equating how much money student-athletes produce for the nation’s athletic departments and if they should be recompensed.
I don’t know if Fien-Helfman will come up with anything innovative gosh knows college athletics and amateurism have been hashed and rehashed forever but it’s nice to know people with Ivy League intelligence are tackling it. And for that we can thank Gene Budig.
