Assuming Drue Jennings’ tenure as Kansas University’s interim athletic director will expire July 1, it appears Jennings will have been more proactive in three months than some ADs have been in three years.
Jennings already has gone down in history as the first KU interim AD to hire a coach — Bill Self as men’s basketball coach in mid-April — and Jennings has continued to do more than just warm the chair in the AD office in the northwest corner of Parrott Complex, all the while commuting from his home in Johnson County.
Jennings’ latest action has been to take steps to generate some badly needed cash for the athletic department.
Tuesday night at a couple of Kansas City-area country clubs, one in Missouri and one in Kansas, a couple of dinners — much like political fund-raisers — were held at a reported $1,000 and $5,000 a plate.
Self was, not surprisingly, the center of attention because everybody wants to shake the mitt of the new men’s basketball coach.
Jennings didn’t have to take the initiative to start the ball rolling on these fund-raisers, you know. He could have eased back and pointed out he was only a caretaker, that it was up to the next AD to worry about money. Not my job, he could have said, and no one would have complained. Except for one thing.
“I made a promise to the chancellor,” Jennings said, “that I would not leave with lingering expenses.”
It’s no secret the largest of those lingering expenses is the $500,000 the Jayhawks owe Illinois for hiring Self, who had just signed a five-year contract with a clause that stipulated he would owe $100,000 for every year he didn’t remain in Champaign. Kansas knew about the clause, but felt Self was worth the tariff.
The KU Athletic Corp. is also obligated to pay deposed athletic director Al Bohl through June 30, 2004, and Bohl’s salary was $255,000 a year. His salary was the biggest on the Lawrence campus because that’s the going rate these days for a university AD in a major conference.
And, to tell the truth, it wouldn’t surprise me if the Jayhawks had to offer Bohl’s successor even more than 255 grand because that was his salary when he was hired in the summer of 2001. Bohl, like other state employees, did not receive a raise in 2002.
Speaking of Bohl’s … er, Jennings’ successor, we know the wheels are turning. Chancellor Robert Hemenway and Jennings are the only two people involved in the search process, and they must be close to a decision because Jennings declined to comment when I asked him when personal interviews would begin.
Mum has been the word during the entire process because Hemenway believes the ship may have been scuttled last time by loose lips. This time the ship could have sailed without a bilge pump. No leaks.
Back to the Jayhawks’ money woes. In addition to the half-million bucks owed to Illinois and the quarter-million owed Bohl, Kansas was also obligated to pay a partial annuity to Roy Williams that went well into six figures.
Throw in the comparative pocket change of the moving costs for the new men’s basketball staff and, all in all, KU has incurred lingering expenses indeed.
“They amount to several hundred thousand dollars in aggregate,” Jennings said, “and that’s what we’re attempting to raise.”
Jennings stressed he has been careful not to step on the toes of the school’s comprehensive KU First donor program during this stop-gap effort.
“I called some good friends in Kansas City, and they made some calls,” Jennings said. “I don’t really know how many have become involved, but they have been more than willing to help. They’re ready, willing and able to support the program.”
It’s possible, Jennings said, that similar functions will be scheduled in Wichita, Topeka and elsewhere in the Sunflower State, but no dates have been set.
To ask for money in tough economic times takes some moxie, so you have to admire Jennings for taking an innovative step to help the Jayhawks get through tough transitional times.
