When J Batt accepted the athletic director position at Kentucky on June 15, everyone understood Michigan State would need to transition. Very few people blamed him for not staying at a place where the president who hired him is on his way out due - mostly - to board dysfunction.
Transitions happen. Athletic directors leave. Universities move forward.
The transition has actually already happened in every way that matters publicly. J Batt has been introduced at Kentucky, appeared in videos with student-athletes, given interviews wearing Kentucky gear, and spoken about building the nation's premier athletic department. The only place the transition hasn't happened is on Michigan State's organizational chart.
As long as Batt remains the athletic director, the university cannot appoint an interim athletic director to begin leading the department. That leaves coaches, administrators, and staff in an awkward position. Decisions still have to be made, but the person who will be responsible for leading the department for the foreseeable future cannot begin doing so.
The timing could hardly be worse.
Spartan Ventures is scheduled to launch on July 1, ushering in one of the most significant structural changes in the history of Michigan State athletics. Whatever anyone thinks about the model itself, it will require leadership from day one.
Instead, Michigan State is waiting.
There is another wrinkle that makes the current situation more complicated than simply waiting for a departure date.
Under Batt's employment agreement, the financial terms of his departure change depending on who occupies the president's office. If Kevin Guskiewicz is no longer serving as Michigan State's president, Batt's contractual payment is reduced from $5 million to $2.5 million. Guskiewicz, despite announcing that he is leaving for Clemson, remains Michigan State's president.
That contract provision explains why the timing matters.
It also explains why Guskiewicz's situation and Batt's are not the same.
Multiple sources have confirmed that Michigan State stakeholders continue to make an aggressive, behind-the-scenes effort to convince Guskiewicz to stay. Whether those efforts succeed is beside the point. If there is even a small chance the university can retain a president it wants to keep, that effort is understandable.
There is no comparable effort involving Batt.
His decision has been made. Kentucky has hired its athletic director. Michigan State knows it must replace him. There is no active campaign to reverse that decision, no expectation that he will remain in East Lansing.
The transition is inevitable.
So why wait?
Every day that passes is another day Michigan State cannot designate an interim athletic director. Every day is another day a department preparing for one of the most consequential weeks in its history operates without the leadership structure it needs.
That doesn't serve Michigan State.
It doesn't serve Kentucky either. The Wildcats deserve an athletic director whose attention is fully focused on Lexington instead of one who still occupies an office hundreds of miles away.
Batt has every right to the benefits of the contract he negotiated. Nobody should criticize him for that.
But contracts establish legal obligations, they don't answer questions of leadership.
Leadership sometimes means recognizing when your work is finished.
Michigan State is trying to save its president because there remains a possibility he could stay.
No one is trying to save its athletic director because everyone already knows he's leaving.
Those are fundamentally different situations.
The classy move now for Batt is the obvious one.
Thank the people who made your time in East Lansing possible. Shake a few hands. Wish everyone well.
Then hand over the keys.
Michigan State has an athletic department to lead, an interim athletic director to appoint, and a new era beginning on July 1.
The university is ready to move forward.
It's time.
