Studio 12: Ross Bjork

Director of Athletics Ross Bjork spent the hour inside Studio 12 on Wednesday. You can hear the interview by clicking the file below - or by subscribing for free at 12thman.com/podcast.

 


A partial transcript of the conversation is below.


Will Johnson: It is a special edition because once a month we will be joined by our Athletics Director here at Texas A&M University, Ross Bjork. And his time is up. He drew the short straw.
 
Ross Bjork: Here we go.
 
WJ: One Wednesday, a month or Friday, you get that short straw and you come down here and hang out.
 
RB: Hang out with the voices of Texas A&M Athletics. The multiple voices.
 
WJ: Whether you like it or not. But they're glad to hear your voice. It's good to get the voice of the AD on to help things out here.
 
RB: Great to be with you guys. Thank you.
 
WJ: And a lot going on. I mean, but first of all, I had to get this in before we go through the schedule and talk about things that are happening here at A&M. We've had some weather roll into College Station. We were all at basketball with the men taking on ULM on Monday night, we commented, the weather had rolled in, but I thought it was cool that the howling winds and the cold temperature it actually brought you back 25 years to the rivalry game of Emporia State versus Washburn as a fullback. You had some weather there.
 
RB: Yeah, I remember. It was cold. It was windy. They had the open end of the stadium. The wind was howling through, this was back in the day. I mean, you barely had gloves, right? We didn't have all the fancy technical winter gear and all that kind of stuff. You may have had a had a long sleeve T shirt. You may have had the old kind of style tights. Maybe. We didn't have really sideline jackets. And so I just remember just freezing cold wind, a little bit of sleet, a little bit of ice. I'm not one of those guys who remembers a score of every game. I can't recall that, too many other things in my brain cells. But it was not a good night. We lost that game. And, hey, things happen. But yeah, that was a cold, cold, windy, sleet night of college football. And we've all had those moments and all had memories. We remember those times.
 
WJ: But when you tell that story of that football game your senior year, I can hear the wind howling through the helmet. Because I think we've all experienced it, the ear hole, the wind's blowing into the face mask. If you if you break a run, I mean, all you hear is that just insanely cold blow dryer in your face. Contact is difficult that I don't want to take a shot.
 
RB: No, man. Your hands are frozen. Every time you get hit, it just burns you. I don't think we're gonna have that weather this weekend. No, this weekend's gonna be nice. Perfect fall weather day for football upper fifties at kickoff. Get all this junk out of here.
 
Andrew Monaco: Yeah, that's been the nice thing this week. Jimbo and the team, they can go into the into the practice field, go indoors, but on Saturdays it's been gorgeous. Just some great, great days and some really, really good performances. I love watching this team play right now.
 
RB: Absolutely. Got to peak at the right time, no doubt.
 
WJ: Three regular season games left for Jimbo Fisher and this football team. Then it's on to a bowl game, and we will learn that destination and early December. But speaking of the weekend, you know we're going to get good weather, it's gonna clear out. And I was commenting on this last week on this show. There's certain times of the athletic year that is just glorious, because I think when you get to the spring, February and March, you get basketballs, men's and women's in their stretch run. Baseball starting,  softball starting. And we're in this cove in this corner of campus over here with all the athletic facilities. So February, March, you could catch a baseball game in the day, basketball at night, and then we also got the facilities of track, tennis, softball over there. You can catch anything. Well, you get a little bit of this, too in the fall with November/December. Think of this weekend. Friday night. First, soccer. Ellis Field. They're gonna face Texas.
 
RB: Who? Who are we playing? Oh, yeah. I wonder why they did that. I wonder why they matched us with the Longhorns. I wonder who was in that committee room. No, that will be a fun opportunity.
 
WJ: Yeah, Let's start out with soccer. And then that night later, after soccer gets started, men's basketball versus Gonzaga, powerhouse, Top 10.
 
RB: What are they ranked right now? Eight?
 
WJ: Eight. Then Saturday night, Kyle Field, Southeastern Conference football resumes A&M and the Carolina Gamecocks. 6:30 kickoff. This is one of those weekends. You want to take part in this.
 
RB: Yeah. And then if you back up a little a little bit, you go from last week hosting USA women's basketball, and what a great show by Chennedy Carter. 34 points, set a record against Team USA for a collegiate player. And then we had volleyball Friday night. We had men's basketball Monday night. We got volleyball on Wednesday night. Do we have anything Thursday? No. I think Thursday we're off of any activities. And then Friday is just a packed day, but that that's the cool thing about this time of year. You've got basketball heating up. You've got volleyball on their stretch run. You're hosting NCAA soccer with a great program that Coach G operates. And then obviously football, with really a chance to finish on a super high note. And really, we want to be in a position where we're contending, but this year you can almost play the spoiler, right? Obviously win Saturday against South Carolina, but then Georgia. They're gonna flex their muscles and say they're a playoff team. LSU, by the time we play them, is gonna be number 1.
 
WJ: A third one.
 
RB: A third number one team. So this year we have a chance to go into those hostile environments and play the role of spoiler. And I think, talking to our guys, they see what's ahead. And it's going to be a fun final three weeks of the season. But this year, you're right. This time of year, everything kind of blends in. And I think we've even got a softball scrimmage. So there's just lots happening, to your point, at this time of year. It's great to be an Aggie.
 
WJ: You don't get people calling you asking why you scheduled three number ones in football do you? You don't have to field that call?
 
AM: I thought you were going to ask him do they call you for tickets? I really thought you were gonna ask that.
 
WJ: I just assumed they did that.
 
RB: You know, since I'm still, today is day…let's see…we're recording this on a Tuesday, will air this on Wednesday. So Wednesday will be day number 131 on the job. So I'm not being blamed yet for scheduling. That doesn't happen till like year two or three. But who would have thought, right? I mean, you schedule Clemson not really at the point where they were contending for a national championship, you schedule them, okay, it's a good game, ACC out of conference and then bam. They hit their stride. And then obviously Alabama has been the gold standard. And then LSU has burst onto the scene in that top spot.
 
AM: And when you add Clemson, because nothing's done overnight when it comes to football schedules, who knew that it was going to be Jimbo from Florida State? That was a rivalry, like the winner of that game went to the ACC Championship.
 
RB: And then, Oh, by the way, your East opponent on the rotational side is Georgia. And now they're sort of peaking as a top 5, top 8 program. So you probably would not have drew it up that way and say, Hey, we're gonna play at Clemson and at Georgia in the same year. Hopefully we can get a better balance going forward.
 
AM: And you had the most recent announcement of Louisville, we know what Louisville's been with Lamar Jackson. We've seen that. We don't know at the end of the 2020s, they could be they could be the class of the ACC. You don't know. But that's a great schedule.
 
RB: Yeah, it's a great schedule. And if you look at the out of conference, we've got Colorado the next two years, then we shift to Miami and we know what they're capable of as a program. And then Notre Dame, we know what they're capable of. Arizona State, Herm Edwards. But again, that's sort of 6-7 years from now, right? You don't really know. And then Louisville…Satterfield's a great coach, but does he stay? Does he look at another opportunity? I mean, who knows, right? The way these college football programs shift. But we're happy and thrilled with our guy. He's doing a great job. Recruiting is going very well. Continue to build that momentum in the program. But scheduling is a big, big part of kind of how things shape up for the future.
 
WJ: No doubt. And since we have that overlap, basketball is getting going. Football's home stretch. It's November. You call it crunch time in the game of football. So you got Buzz starting, Jimbo rolling through year two. Andrew, we get to go to a lot of practices, we were at both of Buzz's shoot arounds and I mean to me, I want to see if you see it this way Ross, Buzz and Jimbo…yeah, everybody kind of gets to where they want to go in their own route. You wanna win, and Buzz will take his path that way, Jimbo will take his path toward victory. But I just see some similarities in it seems like every time they teach, even if its technique, if it's a play somewhere in there, there's always a life lesson with these guys. I just think they're similar in that manner.
 
RB: Yeah. You know, I was walking out of the game last night with Justin Moore, and, I basically saw, you know, I saw the game. So I'm seeing Buzz in action. I don't get to Jimbo here in a second, because the same thing applies. So you see Buzz in action, and then I see him in the locker room and he's got the players in chairs facing the white board, and he literally sits down in the same row on the front row as the players and he's going over the white board. But he's not talking at them. He's sort of talking with them. And I'm thinking, man, normally a coach is sort of looking down at the players and going, this is what you got to do and here's what you did wrong. Hey, great win. Glad you guys battled back, but here's all things we gotta work on. He was sitting among the players teaching. Okay, so then there's that second moment. I go into his press conference, which every Aggie fan needs to watch his postgame press conference. Actually, we're gonna kind of cut up the part where he talks about fan support and get it into a clip because what he talked about was the right things in terms of building the program and what his focus needs to be. And so the word I used walking out with Justin Moore is I said, I'm not sure I've ever been around a coach, and Jimbo's those exact same way, who's more intentional. There's an intentionality. Hey, I may be I may be yelling at one point right and trying to get a point across. I may be teaching at another point. So the word intentionality comes across in both what Jimbo in his style and then Buzz's style of leadership in coaching. And to me, that's how you have to do it, because our young people that get so much thrown at them, you've got to really kind of sit them down, get them focused in those moments and be intentional because life happens fast. Sports happens fast. Games happen fast. So that's what I've been most impressed with in both those guys is the intentionality piece. And then I was speaking at a group last week and Horseshoe Bay and they're like, man, isn't kind of cool to walk in and you've got your football and your basketball coaches set? And I said, Yes! Absolutely! I go boy, as an AD, the last thing you want to have to do is come in and have to fix high-profile programs. So the luxury that we have is there's stability with both those programs, and it's our job to just propel it and grow it and give them what they need resource-wise and then just let them do their job.
 
AM: That intentionality goes to both. Those coaches are building a culture. So it's new for the returning players for Buzz, but his freshmen and a Quenton Jackson, who's a junior college transfer, this is all they know. So every recruit who comes in afterwards, this is how we do it. This is what Jimbo has started, like when we talked foundation last year. Now everybody who comes in, he doesn't always have to say it. Kellen can say it. You can have everybody say it. That's how you build a culture, isn't it?
 
RB: Yeah. And you've got the returning young men and women, no matter if it's a men's sport or a female sport, you've got to get them to see it, right? And you hope that they do. And then you got the people that you brought in, your recruits, who that's all they know, to your point. And you've got to kind of blend that. Sometimes you may have to talk a little bit differently to each group to get them to kind of see it all the same way. It's fascinating to have that perspective. Then once you have all your roster filled with your recruits than it's sort of a different dynamic because, like you said, that's all they know. So the young guys in Buzz's program, all they know is just intense, hard work, everything. And then the older guys are like, okay, this is a different deal, and we have to adapt. And so I think that's what we saw in the second half. I think we saw the young and the old sort of come together to win that game.
 
AM: So everything that they had done in preseason, everything they had done in boot camp, Jay Jay Chandler says in that game Monday, you know what? I'm going to turn up the defensive intensity. So he goes to the line, takes a charge. Hits a three, takes another charge. Hits another three. He goes through that run, and then you could see it kind of spread to, okay, here comes Josh Nebo. Older guy, first game. But a Quenton Jackson makes a huge play. And then Andre Gordon, the young point guard…
 
RB: How impressive is he?
 
AM: Oh my gosh.
 
WJ: 3,000 yard passer in high school Andre Gordon?
 
AM: Interesting because I had heard that one of the reasons why he wasn't higher was because he played two sports, where I think we need to get back to that. That athletes type thing as opposed to specialization. But you know, he's like some of Jimbo's players in football, if you don't look at a roster and see the FR there as freshmen. He played with the composure of an upperclassman.
 
RB: Now look, we know that hey, a normal game, when we get the program going, we should handle a program like Louisiana-Monroe. Give them credit. They came in and played hard. So it's gonna take some time, but I think what I loved about what Buzz said after the game was Hey, look, regardless of who we're playing, you have to be impressed, and you have to really like the effort in the second half. We didn't fold. We battled. We grinded. We made plays. It was a tough game, but as you build a program, you gotta win games like that. Because it easily could have went the other way, and then it's like, uh oh, how far do we have to go now? I think there's a spark and people see how hard these guys play. So, yeah, it'll be fun to watch.
 
AM: So we have Buzz after every game on radio, on the network. He was literally spent. It was like three questions from John and John gave a comment and Buzz just looked at me and was like I am absolutely spent.
 
RB: Somebody sent me a picture of Buzz like squatted in front of the scorer's table with both fists pumped. He's in a squat position, and he's just into it, you know? And I was sitting behind the bench last night and I mean, you could see him breathing heavy. I mean, it's like he's working out during the game. It's fun to watch.
 
AM: And it doesn't have to be Jimbo and Buzz. It could be Coach Blair. It could be Coach G. Jo Evans, Pat Henry. I don't mean to leave anybody out. Coach Bird…
 
RB: Yeah. Look at Bird and what she's doing with volleyball.
 
AM: Their players know that their head coaches care.
 
RB: That's exactly right. That's what it's all about.