Live Show: Keith Carter from the Ole Miss Insurance Symposium

From the Clark Ford Studio in Oxford, Mississippi, MBW Digital proudly presents the Oxford Exxon podcast. I'd say thanks for tuning in, but why am I going to give you a round of applause for something you're supposed to do to be frank? And now, here are your hosts, Chase Parf. And Broadcast School is really paid off. And Neil McCready. I deserve to be on team. How are you? Good. How are you? Absolutely great. What are you doing this today? They talked about all your accomplishments, all these national championships that have come under your tenure. Do you get the rings? What do you put them? Where's all the hardware stored for you these days? Yeah, I get all the rings, or watches, or sweatshirts. You got so much to do with it, really, on the field. Yeah, that's the thing. They bring me my ring, and I'm like, I don't really deserve any of this. But yeah, I've got a nice collection. And one of these days, when this is all said and done, I'll be able to show those proudly and be able to talk about some really cool things that have happened. The world has changed so much since you took this job, especially with the interim role, and then the full-time position. And everybody talks about it being wins and losses, but it's risk management, it's leadership, it's managing nine-figure budgets, along with partners worth billions of dollars at this point, between ESPN and others. What's the biggest misconception or misunderstanding about your job? I think a lot of people think that I just give speeches and go to games. And I do those things. But there's just so much that happens behind the scenes. And we have an incredible staff. We have about 260 employees with Ole Miss athletics. And I rely on them every single day. I tell people all the time. I'm certainly not an expert in everything we do in athletics. And that's why you've got to bring really good people around you to do those jobs. But I think, and I was telling somebody earlier, I'm in my seventh year as AD now, which is kind of hard to believe. But I would say probably 60% of the things we work on now didn't even exist seven years ago. There's just so many new things. I don't know. It's like that in every business, right? I mean, you got to embrace change. And the one thing that you know is going to happen in whatever industry you're in is changes inevitable. And we've had a lot of that in the last four or five years. So we spend a ton of time. We're going to get into some of this. But you're just on things that, for me, when I got into this position and kind of my whole career coming up through athletics, what you thought was kind of the job description of an AD has certainly changed. But it keeps us busy. It keeps us on our toes. And to me, that's probably the one thing I love about my job the most is that every day you come in with a to-do list. And I don't really get to a lot of my other things on my list because a lot of things are popping up during the day that are new and fresh and unique. But that's pretty neat. You're drinking out of a fire hose at times because so much is changing. And the world of college athletics makes them sense in so many different ways. And you're trying to find some balance in that. But you're also preparing for the future beyond your tenure. And one of those, the ball-timming way, entertainment district that you've gotten all the RFPs and you've gotten bids back. I guess where does that stand right now? And then more importantly, what problem do you feel like this is solving with this project? Well, I think when you're sitting there with the stadium in your small town in Mississippi, you're using that maybe seven. There's an issue we have eight home games. So most of your seven home games, you're maybe hosting graduation in there, maybe you're doing one concert in there. You're just not using it very much. And so for us, we felt like it was important. One, we needed to make some improvements and some enhancements to the stadium. The stadium, if you were there for the two-lane game in December and all the money we spent on fireworks and all the stuff that we did, it was a pretty cool experience. But if you go in there today, when there's nobody in there, it's an older building. It's an older structure and venue. So we need to do some things there to improve. And the way we look at it is that the times of probably launching a three or four hundred million dollar capital campaign in this environment that we're in now, I just don't think those things are going to happen very often. So we needed to get creative. The campus had used this P3 model, public private partnership model on some student housing that they're about to get started. And so we said, let's go out to the market. Let's see what's out there to go, the enhancements to the stadium, but also put in an entertainment district that we can use more than those seven or eight or nine days a year. And so we think it's going to be a really cool addition not only to our campus, but to Oxford, with all the people that are moving here, all the people that are here on weekends, and whether it be for baseball or other sporting events or admitted students day. I mean, there's just so many things that are happening right now. We need more places for people to kind of congregate. So we think it'll be a really neat addition. We're hoping to make some more progress on that later in this month. And hopefully in the next couple months, pick a partner on that. But obviously it'll create things in the stadium that help us. Things that are really cool for the community. But we also think there's going to be some revenue streams there that will help us annually as well. When you've got the, you don't want to be too precise here, but when you get the bids back and you are picking finalists and setting up people for interviews, it's a little like Christmas morning because you didn't know to what scope any of these were going to take. And you give us any idea of simply the scope or the range or the scale that some of these projects are potentially in telling. Yeah, you're right. I mean, we had some concepts that obviously we put out in the RFP. Here are some things that we definitely want. Here are some things we want you to explore when you return your proposal. But yeah, well, I think we're excited to see the creativity, some of the things that each of those proposals will bring back. But we're looking at food and beverage. We're looking at obviously a team store. We're looking at different retail options, potentially hotel, potentially condos, things like that that could not only bring that kind of nightly and weakly component for that area, but there could be people there, potentially living 365 days a year, depending on what models come back. So, we think it's going to be a really neat thing. You're seeing it around the landscape. I mean, I think Wake Forest, South Carolina, and Tennessee is doing something very similar. Just again, finding new revenue streams in creative ways to utilize your stadium. And that was going to one of my questions is this is for the condo part of the condo tail. This is not like the lofts that you know, but with it's 365, you own that throughout the year no matter what. Well, that's potentially, potentially. I mean, that's what we're going to wait and see. We've seen it kind of different in different places. There could be a lease component. There could be an owning component. We're going to kind of see what all that looks like when these proposals come back. What's the time line? You know, I think again, our goal would be to pick a partner maybe in May sometime. And then once that happens, they'll really dive in on the design and development. And our hope is that we could potentially start some construction maybe within eight to 12 months after we pick that partner. I promise I'm moving on, but last one on that. I would be RFP. What are the requirements that every bid had to have as far as the construction and the enhancement? Well, I think that, you know, again, we got back an initial group of proposals. That's been narrowed down some. And so there's a committee that's looking at all that. And I think the ones that we're moving on to the interview phase with, you know, they obviously intrigued, you know, that committee and wanted to spend a little more time with them. But again, I think that's the beauty of it. We have some baseline things that we're like, hey, we want this. We want to create this district. We want to revenue stream out of it. You need office space. We need office space. That's right. Our building is going to come down. We're going to put everything kind of into this new structure. And that's something that we've needed for a while. I mean, you come over to our building. You go over to the O-Math building. And obviously we're tearing down Tad Smith. So ticket office and O-Math. They're looking for temporary space. But at some point, our hope is that we can put all of our offices, really all of our units in one space there in that North-Inzon. And in a lot of ways, so many of the projects you have going on are selling some form of real estate because that even goes for the Jersey patches for the own field brand. And you had to have to like put the playoff game against against Tulane. And what is the balance of trying to maximize revenue there to get something from day one because it nickels better than zero. And then also balancing the fans are used to a certain concept. And maybe their uniform is not having patches or anything like those lines. What have you sort of heard in that arena from fans and owners? Yeah. I think people understand the world. Well, I don't know if they fully understand, but they understand that we're in a world now where revenue is certainly king. We're trying to stretch a dollar as far as we can and we're trying to find new dollars. And so when you add the rev share, that's a $20.5 million line item that we added July one that there's really no, that's an expense on the expense side. There's not necessarily a revenue tied to that. And so we're trying to make sure that we can be creative in that space. So I mean, I don't think people want us to become NASCAR and neither do I. And I actually got in trouble for kind of making that comment one time. Really? You don't think that? Yeah, it wasn't necessarily like a disparagement against NASCAR. We just don't want to have wonder bread and whatever the sponsors are like Ricky Bobby. But at some point, if we can find the appropriate patch and the appropriate partner, that's a potential of a $5 million annual revenue stream give or take. The field logos are in the 3 to 4 million range. So those are significant revenues that can help us with that rev share and operating costs and what that could look like. But certainly to your question, we've had some interest from some organizations and businesses, but we haven't found the right one that's willing to pay the price yet. And for us, again, do we want to sell it for $0.50 on the dollar just to get one or do you want to wait and make sure we get it? get it right because kind of once you take that price point, it's hard to go back on that. So I think right now it will be a little more strategic on that, but if you guys are interested, I'll give you my cell phone a week and certainly talk. I said you live to have Wonderbread if it was the one. - It's a very good thing. - Well, that's the thing, like I love Wonderbread. - Wonderbread's good. But we do want to find the right one that makes sense for us. - And I think it's worth mentioning here, when you see it pop up at different SEC schools, national schools, almost 100% of those are local companies to that area, to that county, or to that simply the footprint with a alumni or an alumnus or something. It has not been a ton of just simply outside companies. However, I can saw with that, like you guys have done a lot to leverage relationships and get somebody in the door, then they see all the positives and maybe get some of the table for different concepts after that. - Yeah, I think what you're seeing is a big company that ends up on a field somewhere, usually has a CEO that's a graduate of that place that has an affinity that wants to find a way to support it. Maybe they get some value from the logo as well. And I'm sure the Jersey patches will be the same. But what we found is that with Afflack is a good example. We built a great relationship with them. We're looking forward to doing more with him in the future. But just like we talk about in recruiting, if you get a recruit to Oxford and you show them what Ole Miss is all about, they always fall in love with it. And we found the same with Afflack and some other companies that may not have a lot of knowledge about Mississippi or Ole Miss or Oxford. But once you get them here, they fall in love for sure. - You said you're running your seventh year now and you're in a job where your like I said, business CEO as much as anything else, but it's public, it's emotional, their message boards, guilty here of analyzing every move. But not just every move, but every future move, every past move. There are all experts on what you should be doing, you guys are all experts on what you should be doing. How did you sort of navigate the public nature of it? But we're so that the pressure, because in some ways you're holding not just the dollars now of donors and corporations and individuals and all these things within IEL, but simply their discretionary enjoyment throughout the year. I mean, is there a personal responsibility? And then, there have been times where the pressure is very difficult just to kind of get through the day. - That's a heavy question. That's a heavy question. No, there is a lot of that. And I think for me, Chase, first and foremost, you know, I'm an alum of Ole Miss. And so for me, like this is the dream job, but it does come with a lot of pressure and a lot of responsibility. You know, when I wake up every day, you know, I don't think about, well, let's do the job this way so I can get the next job. I think about it because I want this place to be great. And because of the experience I had here as a student athlete. So there is a lot of responsibility with that and there's a lot of pressure. But you know, I just try to take it and try it again. I mentioned, we have a great staff, you know, that is super supportive to Chancellor and incredible partner in this. And I don't, I say that intentionally as a partner because I don't look at him as a boss. I think we work really, really well together and man, he's just been an incredible support system for athletics. He believes in athletics and what it means for the institution. But yeah, I mean, there's a lot of pressure and you know, that's probably the one thing that I don't like about the job the most is just how the public nature of it. And you know, you do end up on a message board or you know, you're in the third inning of a baseball game and you're down one to nothing and people are tweeting at you that, you know, we have a problem. We've got seven, you know, six more innings of the game guys. So there's just a lot, there's a lot to that. So that's the part that, you know, I think that, you know, as I look at it and you have to compartmentalize some, you've got to find ways to get away from it and find a little refuge from time to time. But you know, the good parts of it certainly outweigh, you know, those tough parts because of the, you know, just the great things that our student athletes are doing. You know, I never see you on the video board at games. I don't put your breaks up there. No, you're very often. That's a, that is a, that is a direct order. Is it real? Yeah. And no, no, no face on the video board for the AD. But the problem is you end up with a young camera person that's new and a student worker or whatever and they, they like walk up and they're like, I'm like, we're not doing that. So, but now that, that is, I don't, there's tons of people in there that enjoy being on the video board. Let's just make sure that they, they get up there. Tell me a decision making in general and so much of what you do and especially as the nation is watching through the fall and through the, the, the coaching change and people going and being higher. What is the biggest difficulty in making decisions when you don't have full information? It's not like your job is where you get all the spreadsheets and we just have it sitting here and we're going to make the right call because there's so many other variables that go into this kind of what's your circle like? What's that process? How do you go through some of those decisions when there is a bit of guesswork and leap of fate with some of them? Yeah, there's, there's a lot of that in what we do. And, you know, I think that you mentioned earlier, a lot of it is kind of risk management, you know, what we deal with and you know, that whole deal back in the fall was, was certainly there was no manual for that and and again, it was, it was part of it was just the situation and the model that we're in and some of it was the unique people that were in this situation. So, but it was, it was a tough time and you know, going through that whole process and here's the hard part too. You know, when, when schools are firing their coaches in week three and week four and week five, you know, that leaves you eight or nine weeks that you've got to deal with the speculation and obviously coach Kippin was a guy that was always going to be on the list and, and those type of things. So, it's so hard to stay off the list. Yeah, he didn't like being on the list, did he? But it, but it, well, we were doing during that time is, you're obviously trying to hold on to your coach. That's the number one priority, you know, laying in the staffed and some incredible things here in six years. And so, you're trying to hold on to him, but at the same time knowing that you have to have a plan B, you know, and so we had a, we had basically a full search going that whole time kind of in a parallel path. And so, you know, we were, we were talking to other coaches, we were talking to their representation and then, you know, it ended up toward the end, you know, when we finally find out that Lane was leaving was that, you know, we had a guy in our building that the only thing he didn't have on his resume that these other coaches and coaches that ended up in the SEC this year, guys that were at other places and are now in the SEC. The only thing he didn't have is he just hadn't been ahead coach yet. And so, it made a ton of sense to, you know, talking with Pete and his vision for this place, not only, you know, long term, but short term. You know, we had, we had college, you know, playoff games to go win. And so, it was just amazing, you know, for him to be able to come in. And I've said it publicly a bunch like I was, I was truly amazed at how he handled all that. And that two or three, you know, month, period there, you know, holding the staff together, holding the building together and then going and, you know, winning a couple games and being 18 seconds away from playing for a national championship. So, it was awesome. But yeah, there, you know, the other part that was harder in that is while I didn't have all the information, there was a lot that the information that I did have, I couldn't tell anybody. You know, outside of the circle, you know, you're in there with Eric Wood, the senior deputy and Kyle Campbell, who's helping you with, you know, publicity and kind of crisis management stuff. And a few others, but pretty tight route. And then you got donors texting you, you got message board stuff going on, you got tweets going on. But what I found so much in whether it's a search or, you know, trying to solve a problem, the confidentiality and working behind the curtain, you got to keep that stuff tight because it can certainly blow up really quickly. So I think we did a pretty good job of that even though, you know, I had donors text to me, you know, wanting information and those type of things, we tried to keep that tight until that Sunday and then it all kind of blew up. How early did you initiate the turnkey or search firm or those type of things? Well, we're on a retainer with turnkey who's a search firm, one of the top search firms in college sports. And a guy named Chad Chatlose, who we've been working with for probably, I don't know, 12 years. And so he's on retainer. So it's just, you'll have a call to him and say, hey, we need to start a list. We need to, you know, start having some conversations, start watching these guys, whatever. But yeah, we were probably doing that in, you know, week six of the season, you know, maybe even week five after, you know, some of those jobs started to open up. Even though it's worth the in because you had the change, you had golden hired there on that Sunday. You picked a great time, by the way. I had a two hour window where I was not available over like a two week period. It was exactly when people were golden with hard as they had coached. Thanks for that. I really appreciate it. But how did you decide or what was sort of the crisis communication you said or the PR nature of you're watching everybody else be so loud? And in a lot of ways, silence everybody else. Yes, yes. Silence is a very good tool in crisis communication up to a certain point, but the vacuum starts getting field and you have to acknowledge how it may or may not be affecting your reputation or your program or your players or everything else. How did you sort of keep everything in store and have communication going through those channels, but then had enough, I guess, probably resolved to not say anything publicly and get outside the doors at the same time? Yeah, I think, you know, that Sunday morning after the egg bowl, you know, had a couple of team meetings with the leadership group of the team, which was, you know, we could do another hour on that, just how impressive those young men were during that process. But that happened and then obviously we go into, there's a little team meeting at one o'clock and That's when we actually announced Pete was going to be the guy. But all during that behind the scenes there was a lot going on and we know that that Sunday night into that Monday and then even into Tuesday when Lane had his press conference in Baton Rouge. We were pretty quiet. We were really quiet and there was a lot of stuff flying around, a lot of news reports. Marty Smith was growing a beard this long. We all remember that. But all that's happening and for me my whole thing was I wanted to get through Lane's press conference on Tuesday and then we had set all kind of our car wash up for Wednesday. And when we did that, yeah, there was a void and there was a lot of kind of false information filling that void and so we kind of had to just take that a little bit. But I think on Wednesday we were able to kind of get out and talk to the right people and get the right message out and do it the right way. I mean for me it was important to clarify some things. But we weren't going to go down a road that we didn't want to go down and slander or whatever. We wanted to do it classy. But we wanted to set the record straight and I think we were able to do that and I think that Wednesday we went from what's going on. We're getting hammered out there all the stuff to oh, this is what happened and we were able to kind of shift that narrative pretty quick. But I guess my probably default is more of the, let's work behind the scenes until we have something because to me it's just hard to go out there and have to backtrack on something. So I think that worked out pretty well and I think once we got past Wednesday, you know, people respected the way we handled things and we were able to shift that narrative to the truth. >> Podcast also brought to you by the firm. Did your home and auto insurance keep going up? >> The book is at the firm. A proud liberty mutual and safe co insurance agency partner. Take a look. Find out by all Miss alum Brian Hayden. 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Either micro back row during the entire process is there anything you would have done differently because I would back and I'm on the outside but I'm aware of a lot of things with the machinations of what's going on from a national sentiment you want by staying silent letting him make some mistakes and do those different things you sort of won the national narrative and yet you've got shameless getting eligible for 2026 you can have two high's metrophy candidates coming back you've got a math I don't know the exact number but well on the way to or over record breaking year already maybe doubling it before the fiscal is is over for 25 and 26 in some ways as the desk cleared everything is pretty status quo and still on a progression it looks like yeah I think so you know I think it helped that we won those playoff games you know I mean winning helps right if you if you lose to two lane at home we might not even be sitting here right now you know I might I might be asking you guys for a job but you know I think that certainly and I felt that that was what was going to happen because it almost felt like you know once Pete was named and Pete was a huge part of this like Pete didn't even want to do an opening press conference like we had it all teed up and had the suit and ready all that and he's like he called me kind of late the night before and he's like you know one I'm not new to this building and he's like to we're not we're not finished like we're not starting something we're trying to finish something and so you know he put all the focus back on the players and you could feel that in the building you really could I was over there eight hours a day for probably a few weeks you know just making sure how things were going and all that trying to help and support and you could just you could just see in the players eyes and the way they were talking way they were smiling like it was just fun for them to have the focus kind of back on them and so yeah I mean I think we're in a great spot I mean you know obviously our men's basketball you know season didn't go quite likely wanted to had had some fun there at the end in the tournament women's basketball place tomorrow and the NCAA tournament we got all of our spring sports rolling and like you said I think will be a top you know five to 17 preseason in the country next year for football and a great chance to go back to the playoff and in the beauty of that is you know if you knock on that door and you get through the door enough times you're going to you're going to get there and so you know I wouldn't put anything past these guys is that they get back in the playoff next year you're obviously well seasoned at Ole Miss but when you look back at year one year two week one week two are there one or two mistakes that you made that now you kind of laugh about or you you think that you know you would have done differently had it been a little more seasoned in the job. Um I mean a lot of mistakes I mean I'll make ten mistakes before I go to bed tonight you know it's just it's part of it and and I think for us we've always had this mentality that we're going to be aggressive you know we're going to try to think outside the box we're going to try to be first movers I think we have to do that at Ole Miss you know we have to you know our budget this year you mentioned the nine figure budget we'll hit 200 million for next fiscal year budget it's a lot of money right Texas is over 400 million so it's still relative and in kind of what you're what you're working on who you're working against but you know I think early on I was I mean you're pretty naive and you're my first week on the job we have a coaching change and a football coaching search and like I said back in those days that was like the pinnacle you know you're like oh well I'm already hired a coach man it's downhill from here and then you know of course we know COVID hit and then all this new world of college athletics is hit and it looks totally different now but yeah lots of mistakes I mean you you end up you know I think now after five or six years we kind of have our staff in a really good place that I feel really comfortable with you know the people around me and the job that they're doing but yeah I don't it's probably too hard to say one or two because there were probably so many you know back in those days you know just learning it as you go well you leaned into one because you didn't have the tail number of your playing so you get paparazzi coming out of the bushes that yeah as you as you got back into Memphis I'm sure Jimmy was real happy about that yeah that was that was a rookie mistake I was told that the that the tail number also this was the airplane to go interview Lane in Boka so on Thursday I'll never forget and I was told that the tail number was blocked and that's the beauty of that hole like I felt like we handled that search so well it was confidential it was tight you know nothing slipped out until that those pictures and there was literally a guy at Wilson Air and Memphis in the bushes taking pictures of me and Jimmy right after we had we gotten the deal done and so I think it was actually it showed up on the Arkansas message board that where it was worked and that's how it all kind of happened but thankfully we were done and the deal was done and it didn't didn't throw anything off it's probably an impossible question but what is the business model of college athletics right now because in some ways it's taking it out of this hand for this hand it changes every every 10 minutes but when you're sitting down with your style how do you manage finances in today's field yeah I was going to say and it's kind of appropriate for this time of years or by the event you know for for tournament time now and that's kind of how it is because you know Angela Pittman who's our CFO I've worked with even before I was the AD I was at OMAP for years and years she's incredible at what she does you know Denson Hollis and Nine of Jones over in the foundation work very closely with them as well because we have a combined budget like we kind of think about all the money working working together both with the foundation and the department but yeah it's like you know you try to project the best you can you know it's like probably in your business or any business the expense you know side of the ledger seems to grow more than the revenue side but again the chancellor's been fantastic with how he's supported us really in all areas but yeah it's almost like hey where the way we work is that we used to have these five year projections and what we started to realize is that there's no chance we can project five years so now we still have three year projections But it's really more like, hey, we're gonna work on next year's budget. Actually, we're going through that process right now. We're in budget season. And we're gonna try to the best of our ability to project out to three years. But it's just so hard to do. And again, when you have a $20 million line item that's popped on you last year, on the expense side, it's just, it's hard to do. But again, we got great people around us, our donors and our fans, and everybody stepped up tremendously to help, and certainly being a part of the SEC helps as well. You've mentioned a couple of times, Chancellor Brewery, the administration, and the ability that there's so much synergy between all parts of athletics, and the La Siam and elsewhere, that's been a huge push in the positive direction. Because La Siam was your not seeing this. You're seeing fighting from the president's office and these different things. What has been your relationship with Chancellor Brewery? So obviously he's a very athletics first chancellor. And yet, you guys have done a great job of not necessarily needing just this ton of university resources. I go through the budget every year when it's put out. And you look at a score like Missouri, and I get they probably have more sports. But they borrowed 40 million from the University, and they don't have to pay it back or anything. You've done a pretty good job, well, with them to the monopoly situation we're talking about. And I think a lot of that comes with. There is a very streamlined process from administration all the way down to you. Yeah, it's been awesome. So it worked out. I was the interim AD when Larry Sparks was the interim chancellor. And then Chancellor Boyce was hired in October of 2019. He hired me in November of 2019. So we've been together the whole time. And I just knew from day one, well, I'll tell you how I knew that we were going to get along. So I had the whole interview process for the AD. I had drug to Memphis. All these, there was a committee up there and had to do it. It was the Sunday morning after we played LSU in 2019, whatever, sometime in November. And so I go up, I do the interviews on a Sunday. Well, apparently the committee had made their decision and recommended me to the chancellor that night. But I didn't have a chance to meet with him until Thursday. So that's four days. So no sleep, no, you know, one of those like, what's going on? You know, my in, my out, whatever. So he's like, hey, let's meet at my house on Thursday, like six o'clock. So we go over there and we walk in and he's, we sit down and he's like, hey, I'm going to cut to the chase. You get the job, you know, it's your job. We talked about kind of the comp and all that stuff for like three minutes. And he's like, all right, well, you want to get something to eat? I'm like, sure. So I'm thinking we might like go to the square, like to city grocery or something. He's like, let's go to Casamexicana. You go with that. I'm like, perfect. Let's go. Yeah, whatever. So we go, you know, just sloppy Mexican food, you know, together on the night that I got higher. I was like, I'm going to like this guy. We're going to get along. But he's just, he's so, he's so good. You know, he grew up as an athlete. He played college sports. He coached high school sports in Mississippi. Worked his way up to the junior college. Like he's just, he's just a normal guy. And he understands sports. He's passionate about it. He understands the value of sports for the institution. And he supports, you know, in that fashion. So it's just been great. And, you know, we don't always agree exactly on everything. But more times than not we do. And I think he's just got a great mind. He loves this university. You know, his wife when he's kids. He gets it. And I think that's something we certainly have in common as we want to make decisions that are best for this institution. And it's been a really cool, really cool relationship. Whether it's the night you get the job or you make a really hard decision and the golden thing, the hard and the press conference happens and you're getting your truck and you drive home. Or you have, I'm just going to go to bed and my turn on a TV show and binging. I mean, how do you sort of decompress from those difficult days and weeks? Well, kids, I mean, I'm not sure if that's decompression or not. But, you know, family's so important, you know, just spending time with them. And I've got two here at Ole Miss now. So they're out of the house. We still have a 12 year old that we're doing sports with and all that stuff. But you know, people ask me all the time, like, how do you achieve work-life balance? And I'm like, I don't really think that's a thing, you know, especially in our world. So, you'll see us at the Ole Miss baseball game, you know, five wide. All the carters there watching Ole Miss baseball or, you know, we're going up to Minnesota tomorrow to watch the women play. So we spend a lot of time kind of incorporating the family into the job. And we encourage our staff to do the same thing because, you know, whenever we have a staff get together at Christmas or whatever, and I address the whole families, I'm like, you know, I spend more time with your spouse or your, you know, whatever than you do at times. And so one, thank you for that. But we do encourage, like, you've got to find time to spend with your family. You know, I love, I got a few hobbies, you know, I like to get out and go hunting and do some things to kind of decompress. But it's just, you have to find something to kind of compartmentalize this, at least for a little while. So that you can be good at your job, you know, I think you've got to find a way to get away from it so that when you come back to it, you're excited to be there. And so much of that, too, is having support inside the building throughout the day. And as you mentioned, you, Angela and Shannon, have been here for a long time and then bringing on Eric, Alan, when he was here. What is it that makes good leaders under you or you're looking through through that process? What are sort of the secrets also, if you will, that you feel like makes it good fits inside your building? Yeah, I think, you know, you have to start with, well, it's kind of a balance to me. I mean, obviously they have to be capable of doing the job. They have to have all the, you know, the skills to do that. But to me, you want to be around people that you want to work with, you know, that are like-minded in a lot of ways. And that doesn't mean that I want to sit around at our staff meeting and everybody's like, yes, Keith, we should definitely, you know, I don't want like, yes, men and yes, like, you want to have people that challenge you. And, you know, have the kind of devil's advocate point of view of all things, certainly. But, man, we spend so much time at work, so much time at events, like, you have to be around people that you want to be around. And, you know, it's not perfect. You know, I'm not best friends with everybody in our department. But I think for the most part, we all get along really well. We all pull the rope the same direction. And if, you know, again, when we get up in the morning, we go to work. Like, we're excited to go, you know, spend time with that person, solve problems with that person. And I think the other thing that I really learned, and I was speaking to the Chancellor's Leadership class on Tuesday night, which is always a fun group to speak to. And I was talking to him about leadership. And for me, you know, I told him it's about teamwork. And when I was a player, you know, the coach, maybe in high school, but once I got out of high school, the coach was never going to call a timeout and draw up a play for me to go one-on-one again. Like, I was not going to create my own shot. That wasn't my thing. I needed a team. I needed Anthony Bloom to set me like a screen with that big old booty. You know, and then I was going to come off and maybe make a shot. But that's how I feel about our department. Like, we are a team. Like, we all bring different attributes. Things were good at things that were not as good at. But if you can put that that that sum together, you know, you can accomplish a lot of really good things. And I think again, after, you know, five or six years, I think we've been able to do that. You've been very vocal and you interact with the fan base of the donors and everybody involved. And I'm probably going to at least ask you once about it. I'll in a second, where this thing is going. You have no answer for it, which is fine because nobody does. But when you talk about all these change of landscapes, you need more money. Like, because it's this reality. I mean, I don't know where that 200 billion Texas has 400, but it's in the bottom half of the 16th century. Yeah, it's over 13th in the SEC. When you get around the conference table, what are the goals or the abilities to keep fans emotionally engaged in this era? I know game day, obviously, very almost has improved in worlds in game day, the last few years, winning helps. But the other parts of that as well. But how big of a conversation is that? How do we keep everybody engaged and connected? And emotionally, in a good way, there can be a lot of connotations to emotional, but you want emotion for your alma mater and for your sports teams. What plays into that on trying to make sure there's some balance against just the ass that comes so often? Yeah, we talk about that all the time. I actually had a text message from a friend of mine yesterday that he's got seats in the Pavilion Club, the Courtside Club. We're going up on ticket prices and donation prices for next year. He was just like, "I'm not sure I can do this." And I just, the long text back to him that said, "Hey, we spend a lot of time trying to figure out how we cover this expense side of the budget." But also, we don't price fans out. And again, there are some prices that are going to price fans out. And also, maybe there's another seat we can help you find that is good for you and your family, but it's gotten so expensive to do what we do. And I tell people all the time, if I lived on the coast, and I had the same family setup that I have now over the years, it would be hard for me to come to seven football games, and get in the hotel, and pay for the tickets, and food, and do the grove, and then get back late on the Sunday or whatever. So we don't take that for granted that our fans do what they do. That's why we want to put a great product on the field. That's why we want to build a great roster. That's why we want to have great coaches and great facilities and great environments when they come, and so that they can't miss those opportunities. So it's a balance for sure, but I think if you'd asked me this question three years ago, it would have been a little different answer because now with all the money going to the players, which I'm for, I think they deserve a piece of it for sure. But it does add another element to where does that come from. So if you're an Ole Miss fan, please know that we spend a lot of time trying to find a perfect balance of that to where we can put a great product on the field, but also, you know, not make it totally crazy for you to come to a game. Is more stability in guard roles required for this thing, not to be poisoned at some point? - Yeah, but I just, I think it's not a short-term fix. You know, I think there's gonna be more bumps in the road before we get there. And you know, the two pathways that everybody keeps talking about are, you know, federal legislation where we get a bill in Washington that helps us or collected bargaining. And so I think we're probably gonna go down, you know, one of those roads or combination of those roads at some point, you know, there's been some discussion last week about your conferences stepping away from the NCAA and, you know, that may be part of the solution as well. But I just think we're in a place right now where, as I said, I'm all four student athletes getting more and things that they deserve. But I think the pendulum has swung really far to that direction right now. And so we've got to find a way to find that right balance. But, you know, if I'm a, you know, just candidly, if I'm a player, if I'm a football player, you know, what incentive do I have right now to come to the table to collectively bargain a deal? I mean, there's no limit to what you can get paid right now, you know? So there's a lot that is there to unpack. And again, that's what we spend that 60% of the time on that we did five years ago. But there's a lot of smart people working on it. We spend a lot of time not only at the campus level, but at the conference level with the AEDs, the presidents and chancellors, I guarantee you, if you had told them 10 years ago, and you'd be wanting to become a president, or you're going to be talking this much about college athletics and be like, we're out, you know? Because they spend so much time talking about it as well. So we'll get there, but yeah, it's a lot. Well, it's so much of it is, and Ole Miss hasn't experienced this, and I know you're hoping it does not happen during your tenure, but there's a different business model when you finally don't have a 10 win season. Yeah, man, you're having a, look at a totally different set of problems, and basketball doing it with it, and some extent right now, but football drives in such a different structure and exponent. That's a different situation of now. How do you get people being engaged to get back and build back versus simply what's going on right now, which is almost just going to roll in. Yeah, I mean, we're in a great spot, and we plan on winning at least 10 this year too. So Coach Golding said that for sure. But yeah, I think, you know, you're one or two tough seasons away from it looking totally different. You know, if all of a sudden your donors are like, well, you know, we help support this roster, and we went seven in five, you might be able to get away with that one year, but if you back that up with another seven in five, because let's be honest, I mean, you know, the goal now is the playoff, right? And I think we're going to see some expansion there. We'll probably at least get to 16, and I think you ultimately made me 24 teams in the playoff, which that would be great, you know, if we have an opportunity to, you know, for the SEC to send, you know, seven or eight teams or 16 to the playoffs, that would give us all a great, you know, opportunity to enjoy seasons and have that kind of carrot out there. But yeah, if you go a couple years without making it, and you know, we're ending up in a bowl in Texas or Florida or Las Vegas, I'm just not sure what the appetite is for that moving forward. Did you kind of, Grant or knew it was coming when Sanky did it, at least float the break apart thing the day? On the layer? Yeah. There's been a lot of discussion behind the scenes on, not just that, but what is the model moving forward? That's one of the options. It's not an easy option. It's not, I don't think it's the desired option for anybody. But I think there's some things that are happening nationally that are just getting to the point where we're not sure we can do it anymore, you know. Your enforcement is so subjective, you know, with eligibility and, you know, just a lot of stuff that's out there. You know, candidly, we've been talking about for a while, and now with all the money involved, it's just become, you know, so much more visible. So, yeah, I was kind of surprised that he, you know, he put it out there publicly, but certainly those discussions have been going on. Last thing here, and you mentioned earlier on, that it's a dream job for you, and there's so many perks and pauses that come through your position, and you're an alumnus. You care about the place so much. Are you surprised by some of the lengthier ten years at the A.D.'s, the places they don't have that emotional attachment to it? It almost seems like that's this positive prerequisite just to deal with the other changing, because it's beyond as somebody could go into the private sector, do something different with their abilities, and yet it seems like some type of tie is almost that extra little incentive to prolong some of these tenures. - Yeah, you know, what's crazy is I'm in my seventh year, and I think I'm the sixth most tenured A.D. in our room, which is hard to think about, you know, to think about, you know, Mitch Barnhart just retired. - He was 25. - He was 25. He was the most. So, yeah, I think that you're looking at guys like Greg Byrne, who's going into year 10, I think at Alabama, or Scott Strickland, who's at eight or nine at Florida. I feel like some of the guys that maybe aren't at their alma mater, potentially have some options. You know, because at some point, if it gets a little too hot, or you're not winning as many games, you can kind of stay ahead of the posse and move on to the next opportunity. For me, you know, that's not really a desire of mine. You know, I want to be here, and back to your question about pressure, I mean, I think that's a little added pressure from a standpoint of like, one, I want to be successful. I want to let it to be successful. But, you know, when I retire, I want to live here, you know, so I don't want to, I don't want to, you know, do anything that would cause that to go south, or whatever that looks like. So, you know, we talk about a lot about that at home, is just how, you know, this is the dream job, but at the same time, like, you know, we're kind of, we're kind of pot committed, you know, here at Ole Miss, which is a really good thing, but also a little bit of pressure to it too. - Has anyone ever reached out and asked? - For you, anywhere else? - For another job. - Yeah, yeah. - I mean, there's always inquiries. - I'm just curious. - But, nothing that would want to make me leave this place. So, Keith Goddard, welcome. Thank you all so much. (audience applauding)