Texas A&M AD Bjork talks coronavirus, Year 1 and next season’s football promise
Texas A&M athletic director Ross Bjork searches for the right word to describe his world these days.
The coronavirus pandemic has canceled just about anything sports-related this spring, leaving Bjork in a similar spot as the rest of the country.
“I don’t really have the right adjective to describe it,” Bjork told the Star-Telegram in a phone interview last week. “I’ve used surreal. I’ve used bizarre. I’ve used sad. I’ve used detachment to describe the feeling. Odd is another word. It’s probably a little bit of everything.
“No one has had to face this ever before in modern times. There’s been other pandemics in our country, but in terms of modern day college athletics and running universities in a large scale like this, we’ve never had to face this. Sept. 11 comes to mind, but we knew that was short term. We knew that we were going to get back to playing games and celebrating college athletics and honoring the victims. That was a short period compared to this ‘cause there’s so many unknowns.”
That starts with the question of when some normalcy will return. When sports will return.
For Bjork and A&M, this should be the time everyone is talking about spring football and quarterback Kellen Mond going into his senior season. It should be about the development of the players from the 2019 recruiting class, ranked as the fourth-best in the country, and the incoming 2020 class ranked as the sixth-best in the country, per 247Sports.
And coach Jimbo Fisher entering his third season with momentum after knocking off Oklahoma State in the Texas Bowl last December.
“The pieces have all been coming together ever since Jimbo got here,” said Bjork, who was hired last July.
“My job is to support him and help grow on that. You look at the last two recruiting classes — that’s what it takes. Being in the SEC, you have to recruit in the top five, top eight level in the country. You see the momentum happening with that and winning the bowl game. You see all the returning players. You see the newcomers, especially offensively.
“One of the things I’m excited to see is how much more explosive we’re going to be on offense with all the game-breakers and playmakers either on campus and emerging, or coming to campus as newcomers. That’s going to be exciting.”
But, like with everything else these days, the coronavirus cloud hangs over everything.
As Bjork ended his answer on next year’s football team, he said: “That’s what’s sad about where we are. We wanted this time to talk about spring practice. Talk about Kellen Mond going into his senior year and the newcomers making an impact. That’s what’s disheartening.
“You’re not able to really see that up close, but we’ll have the summer to build on it and make it exciting. When we do come together, it’s going to be awesome.”
Bjork touched on a number of other topics with the Star-Telegram:
On his concern with student-athletes not having any real structure right now: “Right now, I’d say we’re all concerned about what normalcy will be like. [Student-athletes] are so used to a regimented week and schedule. There isn’t the normalcy that they’re used to. We’re going to prepare the best we can. I trust our young people, but I also know they’re young people and there’s going to be different temptations. We have to make sure we stay in touch with them every way possible.”
On his view on extra eligibility for spring sport athletes: “This is unprecedented, so let’s relax the rules and really let the coach and athlete decide on what’s best for the athlete. What’s best for the program. Just talking about the seniors, not everyone would take us up on the opportunity, but some would. For some, it would be a great story. For others, they’re ready to move on. I’m more for liberalizing those eligibility rules. It’s so fresh and we need to give peace of mind to our athletes, and then let’s work out the details as we move forward over the next several weeks.”
On A&M prepared financially for costs associated with extra eligibility: “We’re going to be facing some significant financial downfall, especially this fiscal year. It’s easy to say A&M would be OK, but we’re counting every penny at this point just because we don’t know the complete fallout. Extra eligibility would be an increase [in costs] for sure, but if that’s what it takes to error on the side of student-athletes, then we want to be for the student-athlete first and foremost.”
On Year 1 at A&M: “It’s really been everything that I expected. I expected people to think at a higher level. I expected our student-athletes to be impressive and competing at a high level. Just intellectually I’ve been so impressed every time I’ve engaged with our student athletes. We have top-flight coaches in coach Fisher and coach [Buzz] Williams and coach [Gary] Blair and Pat Henry and the list goes on. I’ve been impressed working with them.
“And then connecting with Aggies. Aggies are just down-to-earth people. They love to work hard. They love to get together and gather. They think at a higher level. They always want to help. It’s exceeded my expectations, but I’m not surprised. That’s how A&M has built itself as one of the best universities in the country. All of those things that I expected have come true and then some. It’s been a lot of fun.”
