Sources: Jim Hackett leaving Michigan as AD soon
Michigan interim athletic director Jim Hackett will not seek a permanent position in that role, and the university already has hired a search firm and is organizing a committee to facilitate hiring an athletic director, two sources with knowledge of the situation told The Detroit News.
The sources requested anonymity because Hackett has not announced his plans. A formal announcement is expected this week.
Michigan’s search for a new athletic director has not yet begun, sources said, but four names that have been linked to the job in the past, including three Michigan alums -- Brad Bates, athletic director at Boston College; Warde Manuel, athletic director at Connecticut; and Joe Parker, athletic director of Colorado State -- have surfaced. Also considered a potential candidate is Arkansas athletic director Jeff Long, also the chairman of the College Football Playoff committee. Long was an associate athletic director at Michigan and his wife is an Ann Arbor native.
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Hackett, 60, the former Michigan football player and retired CEO of Steelcase, was hired by U-M president Mark Schlissel last year after Dave Brandon resigned on Oct. 31. During his time as interim athletic director, he fired former football coach Brady Hoke after a 5-7 record in his fourth season last year and then hired Jim Harbaugh, who led the team to a 9-3 record this season. Hackett also negotiated with and signed Nike as the new apparel partner of athletics.
But Hackett had never fully committed to the idea of being Michigan’s permanent athletic director. He maintains his home in Grand Rapids but as part of his $600,000 annual salary from UM was given an Ann Arbor residence. He also serves on multiple corporate boards, including Ford and Fifth Third Bank.
Hackett will stay in the role until an athletic director is hired and will very much be involved in the hiring of his successor. The search firm, which Hackett was involved in hiring, has been in place for several weeks. A UM-based committee will include Schlissel and Hackett.
After the hiring of a permanent athletic director, Hackett will remain involved in Michigan athletics as a consultant to Schlissel.
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Hackett orchestrated two major deals in the past year – landing Harbaugh and signing Nike, which includes Michigan having the first football program associated with the Nike Jordan brand. He ran the Harbaugh search almost clandestinely, his staff secreted away in the suites above Michigan Stadium working on what he dubbed “Project Unicorn.”
Then he turned his attention to entertaining the three major manufacturers, Nike, Under Armour and Adidas, with the current Adidas contract nearing expiration. The deal with Nike, worth $122.3 million over 11 years with an option to extend another four years taking the total value to $169 million, was finalized last July.
Hackett then spoke vaguely about his future saying, “I’m about to try and get a grip on that,” adding he had a larger issues to settle.
He has not been a hands-on manager, opting to give much of the workload to Chrissi Rawak, executive senior associate athletic director, and also Rob Rademacher, chief operating officer who is handling the latest athletics facilities project.
“They pray I don’t manage the day-to-day,” Hackett said in July when meeting with a small group of reporters. “It’s a perfect fit for my style. I work really hard, I want to share. I’m really good at working on the future.”
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The department also has had a recent assist from retired Oregon State athletic director Bob DeCarolis, who had previously worked for Michigan and returned to Ann Arbor to retire. Hackett made clear in July that DeCarolis would not be considered a candidate for athletic director but instead would help Rademacher.
Hackett’s biggest move as interim athletic director was the hiring of Harbaugh. In a recent interview with The Detroit News, Hackett said he likens Harbaugh to NFL coaching legend Paul Brown, with whom his father worked to establish an NFL team in Cincinnati.
“He was one of the most extraordinary innovators, and this guy we have at Michigan is like that,” Hackett said, referring to Harbaugh. “When I heard my dad talk about Brown, I now see it in this coach. (Harbaugh’s) always thinking about the construct of the game and ways to win it. All parts of it. I have a feeling it’s one a generation, these types of instincts.
“Look how far ahead (Harbaugh) was in the camp structure, and the practice schedule he put together for the spring. It was a Rubik’s cube of the highest order. He wanted to honor their academics and to build that schedule, he spent a lot of time on that. It was pure genius crafting that. The decision to use the field time instead of (football) class time in the spring, he had to think of a way to improve, because his team hadn’t been in a bowl game.
"It explains some of the progress he’s made that people didn’t expect. I deliberately stay out of their way. I’m not in the practice meetings, but someday I might ask him to let me to be in on the design of football.”