Big 12 commish Brett Yormark on competing with Big Ten and SEC, adding Arizona, going national (2024)

TEMPE— From the moment he became Big 12 commissioner in August 2022, Brett Yormark has been unrelentingly aggressive.

Less than a month out from those four officially joining the league, Yormark continues his pursuit of excellence for the Big 12. He outlined his vision for the conference in front of the Arizona Board of Regents on Thursday, and the top-line item is unambiguously bold:

“We aim to be the most relevant and nationally recognized conference.”

The Big 12 isn’t bringing in as much revenue as the Big Ten and SEC. It doesn’t have as many big brands — and in fact is losing its two biggest, Oklahoma and Texas, to the SEC.

That isn’t stopping Yormark and his staff from doing everything they can to enhance and expand the Big 12’s brand.

“When I took this job initially, I aspired to be a national conference,” Yormark, who previously worked in professional sports and the music industry, told ABOR. “I wanted it to be relevant and on the consciousness of future student-athletes from coast to coast.”

On July 1, the Big 12 will grow to 16 schools across 10 states. Yormark estimates that its new footprint will encompass 90 million people.

During Yormark’s brief tenure, the Big 12 also has more than doubled the size of its front-office staff, brought its commercial business in-house, increased its sponsorships, upped its ticket sales and strengthened its connection to its student-athletes through multiple initiatives.

Yormark isunafraid to try new things. This past spring, the Big 12 became the first league to conduct conference-wide pro days in conjunction with the NFL. Big 12 Football Media Days next month will be held in Las Vegas for the first time. The football schedule is dotted with Thursday- and Friday-night games to boost the league’s visibility.

After his presentation to ABOR and before he jetted out of town, Yormark sat down with the Star for about 10 minutes to discuss the burgeoning Big 12 and how Arizona will fit into it. Here’s a portion of that conversation, which has been lightly edited.

During the presentation, your first slide was about establishing the Big 12 as the No. 1 brand in college sports. You also acknowledged the competition. Can you elaborate on that idea?

A: “Relevance to me is critically important. I used that word a lot in our board meeting last year. We don’t need to be the biggest. We don’t need to have the most resources, even though I don’t concede that. But we can be the most relevant when we think about our brand, what we stand for, how we connect with future student-athletes, etc.

“If you think about the Big 12 today versus when I came here, no one can debate that we are more relevant now than ever before. That’s by design.

“How do we market? How do we create a bigger narrative? How do we work with ESPN and FOX specifically? How do we engage fans through social media? Our goal is to continue to do that to get into the consciousness of all the right people.”

How do you avoid getting swallowed up by the Big Ten and SEC, who consume so much of the oxygen in this space?

A: “Everyone looks different, no question about it. But brand relevance is not always going to be determined by how many resources you have. Look at the professional leagues. There are certain brands that have more resources, but that doesn't define their relevance within the NFL or the NBA. I never looked at it (like) that.

“I took that mindset into the job. You can’t argue that we're more relevant now than we've ever been within the collegiate landscape and, for that matter, outside of it, despite the losses of two major brands.

“I'm verybullish on our future. I think the Four Corners coming into the conference give us great relevance (and) a national footprint. Together, we have a chance to be pretty special.”

Why was it so important to you to get Colorado, Arizona, ASU and Utah?

A: “When I first got here, I wasn't as familiar with those schools as I am now obviously. But geographic location. Their strength in Olympic sports, football, basketball. A lot of value. So when we did scenario management, we thought about realignment and where it could go. That ‘A’ scenario was, ‘Boy, could we get the Four Corners?’ And thankfully we did.”

You were very proactive about it.

A: “With some people, the more traditionalists within the industry, they probably took exception to the fact that I was somewhat outspoken about it, my desires to go west. In some respects, I telegraphed what I wanted to do. But I'm not a shock-and-awe guy. If I want something I'm going to tell you I want it, and I'm going to try to work hard to get it.”

You talked about this idea of a “reset” in college athletics. How can you do that while still giving student-athletes a true college experience?

A: “When I think about a reset, it's a holistic reset. And it has to be goal-driven. We can't give up the purpose-driven nature of what we do, the student-athlete experience and the investments we're making there.

“But at the same time, we have to embrace this new model. And they can coexist. A very simple example was my point about how we took the history and the future and brought them together for our football championship. Everyone said there's no way you should do a halftime football show. We had an artist (Nelly) that was willing to choreograph something with the bands. It peaked ratings, and now everyone wants it again next year, which we're going to do.

“That's at avery low level, but I think you can take the great parts of the current model and marry those with a bit of a new model and come up with something that's pretty good.”

It oftenfeels like those two things are in conflict.

A: “Thereality is that they might appear to be in conflict right now, but we're gonna have to make it work. We're gonna have to. That's our mission.”

ESPN+ is a big change for Arizona fans who are used to the Pac-12 Networks — and have spent years complaining about their lack of availability on certain platforms. What are the benefits of being affiliated with ESPN+?

A: “We’re widely distributed. When you think about ESPN and FOX, our linear distribution is fantastic. When you think about all sports, including Olympic sports ... ESPN+, Big 12 Now is growing. They have (about) 25 million subscribers and growing. So I really like how we're positioned with ESPN and FOX.

“Fans should be embracing that. Because to your point, there seemed to be some issues in how some programming was distributed in the Pac-12.”

What does Arizona bring to the Big 12 in your view?

A: “I’m all in. Olympic sports, great. Football had a 10-win season last year (and) should be at the top of the conference this year. Won the Alamo Bowl game obviously. Basketball, Tommy Lloyd’s done a great job — 25-plus wins the last three seasons. Women's basketball is on the rise. Softball has a great history. I'm indoctrinating myself into (those) programs. Very valuable programs and very additive to the Big 12.”