Massive East hires new commissioner: Former Main League Baseball exec Tim Brosnan chosen to run the convention

The brand new commissioner of the Massive East is one thing of a curveball. The league introduced on Monday the hiring of former Main League Baseball government Tim Brosnan, a 68-year-old Georgetown grad who will change outgoing commissioner Val Ackerman on Sept. 1.

Ackerman, a Corridor of Fame government, spent the previous 13 years operating the Massive East and devoted her life to Basketball. From a résumé perspective, Brosnan is an bold swing in a special path. He has minimal expertise within the basketball sector, however his in depth data on the earth of sports activities enterprise and finance made his candidacy all of the extra compelling to the Massive East’s 11 faculty presidents, who collectively made the choice to deliver aboard Brosnan over a wide range of different candidates with backgrounds and monitor information in school sports activities. St. John’s p president Rev. Brian J. Shanley serves because the league’s Board of Administrators chair. 

“In our seek for the subsequent Commissioner of the Massive East, we prioritized discovering somebody with in depth expertise within the space of income technology and who would finest match the mission and imaginative and prescient of our convention going ahead,” Shanley mentioned in a press release. “Over the course of his profession, Tim Brosnan has proven to be a wise, extremely revered chief with excessive private {and professional} values rooted in his dedication to the service of others. His monitor file of forging extremely profitable partnerships might be crucial on this new period of faculty athletics. Tim is a relationship-builder and, as a former student-athlete within the convention, cares deeply concerning the success of the younger women and men who characterize the Massive East.”

Brosnan graduated from Georgetown in 1980, the place he was a four-year member of the Hoyas’ baseball group. He spent 24 years with MLB and was a candidate to be that league’s commissioner earlier than Rob Manfred gained the job almost 12 years in the past to the day (Aug. 14, 2014). Brosnan’s enterprise connections and command of the monetary sector in skilled sports activities was an enormous promote for his candidacy to run the Massive East, a basketball-first convention in a football-dominated world that might want to proceed to maintain tempo financially as a way to stay related and aggressive nationally into the 2030s.

Along with being CEO of Main League Baseball Enterprises, Brosnan was additionally, extra not too long ago, a key determine in operating Georgetown’s NIL collective. Sports activities Enterprise Journal has beforehand and incessantly named Brosnan amongst its annual rating of the “50 Most Influential Individuals in Sports activities,” in no small half as a result of he was on the desk when it got here to negotiating MLB’s media rights offers on a number of events.

Changing Ackerman might be an enormous process. The Massive East stabilized after convention realignment within the early 2010s threatened to downgrade the league. As an alternative, Villanova and Connecticut have gained a mixed 4 nationwide titles previously decade and helped maintain the convention respectable. St. John’s latest resurgence has additionally been important to the Massive East’s renewed aggressive push amid the backdrop of a always shifting financial panorama in school sports activities. 

“The Massive East is without doubt one of the most iconic manufacturers in school sports activities, and I’m grateful and deeply honored to have the chance to steer the convention into its subsequent chapter,” Brosnan mentioned in a press release. “Along with our member establishments, and all of our Massive East companions, we’ll proceed to raise the student-athlete expertise, strengthen the convention’s aggressive place, and embrace the alternatives that lie forward whereas staying true to the values which have outlined the Massive East for generations.” 

Brosnan additionally has been a Board of Regents member at his alma mater, along with a litany of different appointments in and round New York Metropolis. He beat out a deep and eclectic pool of candidates for the job, sources mentioned, with the ultimate resolution coming in late July. The selection has turned some heads within the school house, per sources who spoke with CBS Sports activities, as the choice ought to show to be a crucial one on this more and more turbulent period of participant empowerment and roster instability. 

The hope is Brosnan’s enterprise acumen and a long time of involvement in brokering large offers won’t simply maintain the Massive East afloat within the years to come back, however truly enhance its monetary and aggressive standing in Division I.