Tom Jurich's Louisville legacy: bold businessman or bully? Depends on who you ask

Tom Jurich inspires devotion and dread. Though his mark on the University of Louisville is large and indelible, he leaves it branded as a "bully" who was fired for "just cause."

U of L’s recently ousted athletic director ranked sixth in Louisville Magazine’s latest rankings of the city’s most powerful people, but he inspires such polarized perceptions that it suggests a split personality.

To WAVE general manager Ken Selvaggi, Jurich is “a terrific gentleman and a class individual.” To ESPN 680’s Bob Valvano, he is a bully whose management style “steamrolled a bunch of people.” To Fellowship of Christian Athletes chaplain Chris Morgan, he is a friend committed to his faith and "a man of integrity." To one former U of L staff member, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation, Jurich inspires so much animosity that for Lent she once gave up hating him.

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What all of them agree on is that Jurich, 61, produced remarkable results for two decades at Louisville, growing the school's athletic programs and building up facilities along Floyd Street. His 20-year tenure produced 67 conference championships, 287 All-Americans, $278.8 million in new or renovated facilities and a more than sixfold increase in U of L’s annual athletic budget, from $16.5 million to $104.5 million, according to university records.

"I know there’s a tendency to kick people when they’re perceived to be down," Jurich told Courier Journal. "And I’m down. I get that. ... But I think we left it pretty good."

Jurich's success has been so striking that many Louisville fans have found it easy to justify methods interim President Greg Postel sharply criticized in Jurich’s termination letter as a “lack of collegiality best characterized as intimidation and bullying that extends from student government to the University’s senior leadership.” 

A Courier Journal review of Postel's emails during the week following Jurich's firing revealed a 15-to-1 ratio in favor of the deposed athletic director. 

“Tom is very, very firm and strong-headed,” former U of L trustee Jonathan Blue said. “That’s his greatest strength. In order to get things done, you’ve got to plow through barricades. I think for some people that can be a little bit unnerving.”

“If you’re a U of L fan, they owe him so much,” former associate athletic director Mike Pollio said. “And they will owe him so much for a long time. It made me sick the way it ended. Whether people believe he was part of the problem or not, the only guy who can get us out of this mess is Tom Jurich.”

The mess Pollio describes is multilayered. It includes pending NCAA penalties for a scandal involving prostitutes employed as a recruiting tool, an FBI investigation that uncovered an alleged bribery scheme behind the recruitment of Brian Bowen by the men's basketball program and what Postel called, with broad-brush disapproval, a “culture of tolerance.”

It is a mess that has cost Jurich his job and emboldened some of his critics to go public with long-standing grievances. For example, after Jurich was placed on administrative leave in September, Valvano told his radio audience the athletic director had treated him like “dog crap” for years.

“I think for a number of reasons, probably professional practical reasons, there’ve been a lot of people in this city who felt the same way and didn’t want to step forward and still may not now,” Valvano said. “... I’ve never seen an athletic director that for years and years and years and years was as celebrated as he is and yet he still felt (it) necessary to bully people.”

Jurich's response: "I don’t think I’ve ever had a cross word with Bob Valvano. I don’t think I’ve had hardly any interaction with Bob Valvano. I liked him very much. I don’t understand where he comes from. I can’t remember being interviewed by Bob Valvano, other than maybe something on a road trip with basketball. Honestly, I have no idea."

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Susan Sweeney Crum, wife of Denny, the former Louisville basketball coach Jurich forced into retirement, alleged via Facebook that he had also tried to get her fired from WDRB by using her position “as a bargaining chip in negotiations for UL broadcast rights.” She declined to elaborate when contacted by Courier Journal.

WDRB President Bill Lamb disputed her account: "I don't believe (Jurich) was in Susan's fan club, but he never asked me to fire her. Not once. She was never discussed as a bargaining chip, and I am confident he knows I wouldn't have used her in that way if he had asked."

Jurich also denied that account.

"We never even dealt with (WDRB) for rights," he said. "When they came up, Bill (Lamb) didn’t even bid on them."

Concerning Susan Sweeney Crum, Jurich said, "She's wanted me dead forever."

Multiple sources recall Jurich venting — and in the presence of media members — that he wanted to punch talk show host Tony Vanetti in the face hard enough to hear his bones break. Vanetti declined to comment.

"If I ever said that, I was joking," Jurich said. "I like Tony Vanetti.”

Two other local sportscasters, asked to comment on Jurich’s alleged bullying in separate interviews, registered their reluctance to discuss their dealings with him with identical replies: “What’s the upside?”

'Just cause'

Whether Jurich crossed the line between businesslike hardball and abusive behavior is central to the university’s case for a “just cause” firing. In his view, the bullying charge comes as a “cheap shot” after two decades of widely praised stewardship.  In a statement released by Jurich’s attorneys, the termination letter was described as a “smear,” and Postel and board chairman David Grissom were accused of “character assassination.”

"I’ve never seen anything that would be remotely considered bullying," said Larry Benz, former chairman of U of L's board of trustees and a Jurich neighbor. "I just have to laugh at that term in part because it’s so fashionable right now. I can’t give any credence to anything I’ve seen that Tom Jurich has any tendencies along those lines.

"People who tend to have issues with anger and bullying, it shows up consistently. It’s easy to make accusations of that nature, but without empirical underpinning, I’m highly suspicious that they’re credible."

To that point, Postel's letter of termination cites no specific instances of Jurich bullying and names no purported victims. While conceding, "It's no secret that I did not enjoy working with him last year," former student body President Aaron Vance declined to discuss any bullying issues with Jurich, citing the possibility of future litigation. 

Former women’s basketball coach Sara White did not hesitate to share her concerns, however. She claims Jurich used homophobic terms to describe an assistant coach and pressured White to fire her “because she was gay and not feminine.” White says Jurich also shared damaging information about her then-husband Martin Clapp — the women's team’s co-coach at that time — an exchange she interpreted as an implicit warning.

“I got the impression he was trying to shut me up,” White said. “I was shocked he would stoop to that level. I thought it was a veiled threat: ‘Keep your mouth shut. Keep in your lane. I have information that can (hurt you).’”

In the course of an interview that spanned nearly two hours, Jurich reacted most vehemently to White's allegations and repeatedly returned to the subject without prompting. 

"That’s crazy," he said. "I have lots of gays and lesbians that work for me. ... I’ve shown more respect to the LGBT community than anything. That’s ridiculous."

Jurich's wife, Terrilyn, sat by her husband's side during his interview with Courier Journal and reacted tearfully to several unflattering allegations and anecdotes.

“This man is not who people are saying,” she said. “He is such a good and kind man and a man of integrity. That’s what’s so hard. He always wants to do the right thing. He’s such an honorable man. He’s not a liar.

“... It seems evident to me that people want to throw darts just to hurt him, not even using evidence and facts.”

'Where we came from'

Jurich supporters point to the allegiance and longevity of his staff as evidence of his popularity and describe him making regular rounds and inquiring about what he could do to help programs prosper. As Jurich awaited his fate in October, all but three of the school’s 18 varsity coaches signed a letter on his behalf. Another letter of support was signed by major donors Jim Patterson and Mark Lynn and Lonnie Ali, the widow of former heavyweight champion boxer Muhammad Ali.

In protest of Jurich’s firing, Max Baumgardner redirected a pledge worth more than $6 million from U of L athletics to its School of Music and the Norton Children’s Hospital.

“It’s very visible what Tom’s done,” said Louisville spokesman Kenny Klein, a 35-year veteran of the athletic department. “You take the facilities. You take the academics. You take where we’ve come from then and where we are now — just the level we’ve risen from to get us into the ACC. People appreciate that; particularly those who have been around here a long time and understand where we came from.”

Pollio, the former associate athletic director and a holdover from Bill Olsen’s time as athletic director, recalls being struck at an early point in Jurich’s tenure by the new AD's ambition and his conviction.

“He said his goal is to have every team in the top 25, and you don’t laugh at your boss,” Pollio said. “But I thought to myself, ‘Is he nuts?’ We were playing on some really rough surfaces. Our baseball team is out at the Fairgrounds. Our field hockey team is on cinders.

“... Everybody said, ‘We’re going to do for the women.’ Then they’d wink. ... He said, ‘We’re going to treat women equally,’ but he didn’t wink. He said, ‘It’s the right thing to do.’ It was he and I. He didn’t have to blow smoke. He wasn’t talking to a room. He was talking to me. I knew he was special.” 

The university had nine women’s sports and 147 female athletes in 1997, the year Jurich was hired, according to university records. Today, the school’s 13 women’s teams include 391 athletes. Financial aid for female athletes has grown from $767,000 to $5.5 million.

"I’m always going to put Title IX in the forefront because I really believe in it," Jurich said. "It was a very unpopular thing to do in this community. Very unpopular. Because nobody could understand why I would invest so much money in women’s sports. I had one businessman in this town who gave me the most resistance. He tried to humiliate me: 'What businessman would invest this kind of money and get no return on investment?'

"... My comment back to him is you’ll see your return in 20 years. These young ladies are going to come here. We’re going to give them a great experience at this university. They’re not only going to have a great experience — socially, academically, athletically — they’re going to have a well-rounded degree when they leave here. They’re going to go on and have phenomenal careers. They’re going to be unbelievable parents. They’re going to send their kids to the University of Louisville and a lot of them are going to be CEOs. They’re going to give back to the school and they’re going to spread the word about this university."

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In time, Jurich's commitment to a broad-based program helped make Louisville a compelling candidate when the ACC was seeking to fill the vacancy created by Maryland's move to the Big Ten Conference in 2012. Though the University of Connecticut ranked higher academically and better fit the conference’s geographic footprint, it could not match the breadth of what Jurich had built in athletics.

"We were able to merge everyone together and achieve some great things," Jurich said. "You had to have people believe in your vision (and) the people really bought into our program. You could see how the investments really paid for us.

"When we got here, the women were in the basement of Crawford Gym. That was the only place they had for lockers. I went to see this place. I'm only here a couple of days. There are four shower heads in the whole place and two of them didn't work. I literally left there — Mike (Pollio) might have been by my side — and I said, 'We're going to make a difference.'"

The difference is undeniable. WLKY sports director Fred Cowgill, once on the receiving end of a public, point-blank Jurich tongue-lashing prior to a U of L kickoff luncheon, looked upon the AD’s body of work and said, “No one in the history of college athletics has done what he did.”

“Tom deserves to be iconic in U of L history,” said Bill Stone, a board member of the U of L Athletic Association. “The people who worked for him had ultimate confidence in him. Coaches were very loyal to him. ... From the moment he walked into this place, he was always thinking ahead; always thinking about who knew who to get something done.”

Jurich’s networking skills and fundraising prowess have changed the look of the Belknap campus and his ability to select and retain quality coaches has produced both success and stability. In 2007, Jurich was named Athletic Director of the Year by Street & Smith’s sports business publications.

"You look at the most valuable employees this university has ever had," said attorney David Vish, a friend and adviser to Jurich. "No one has made more contributions."

Aired grievances

Few Louisvillians have wielded as much influence during the past two decades. Fewer still have been blamed for as much intimidation.

“If you were on his bad side, there was not a hesitation to let you know,” said Lachlan McLean of WHBE-680, an ESPN affiliate in Louisville. “It’s borderline disingenuous for him to claim that he’s not aware of the perception of him as a bully.”

McLean served a two-week suspension at WHAS-840 in 2007 after reading a listener’s poem on the air that was sharply critical of a Louisville football player. Though that punishment has often been attributed to Jurich's influence on station management and advertisers, McLean said his comments on the matter have been tempered by his lack of hard evidence.

Jurich publicist Bob Gunnell, who takes responsibility for applying pressure on WHAS, said his complaints about McLean were based on comments that were “racially charged” and were lodged on behalf of another of his clients, the downtown Marriott hotel.

“It never made it to U of L,” Gunnell said.

Zach McCrite, a local radio personality known as “Big EZ,” says some of the unconnected dots of his own career can be traced directly to Jurich.

“I found out at a crucial stage in my career that Tom had an influence over who the talent was at least one radio station in the market,” McCrite said of his failure to close a deal with Louisville affiliate WKRD-790. “After talking to Tom personally in his office, I realized it wasn’t going to work out. He told me, ‘Anybody like you is never going to have a spot on my airwaves.'"

McCrite, who left Louisville in 2011 for St. Louis, traces his problems with Jurich to on-air criticism of former Louisville football coach Steve Kragthorpe, who compiled a 15-21 record between 2007 and 2009.

“I don’t harbor any ill will toward Tom or anyone at U of L, but I find the allegations of bullying as believable,” McCrite said. “It is my belief that because I wasn’t a yes man for the University of Louisville 100 percent, that’s part of the reason I didn’t get a job I thought I had nailed.”

Jurich said he remembered McCrite but not meeting with him about "Steve Kragthorpe or airwaves or anything like that." He said, “I’ve never asked anyone to bend for me,” and blames the lingering accusation of his "control" of Louisville media on Kentucky Sports Radio's Matt Jones.

“If you say anything bad about Jurich, phone call,” Jones told his listeners after Jurich’s firing, according to a transcript posted by WHAS. “You could say anything about Rick (Pitino). You could say anything about Bobby (Petrino). But you could not say anything about Tom. That was the constant.

“When you look back and you sorta say, ‘How did this Louisville thing happen?’ In my opinion, it all comes down to the phone call. Everyone was scared.”

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Announcers depend on the trust of their audience, but those whose stations are affiliated with a university sports program or a professional franchise are often hired subject to the approval of the teams they cover. Sports executives can use the leverage like a lead pipe, and this can lead to an agonizing choice between credibility and continued employment.

“Tom never tried any of that with me,” said former Courier Journal editor Bennie Ivory, whose retirement party was attended by Jurich. “(But) I can see how he might do that with some other folks if you let him.”

“There were times when he was less friendly and maybe even cold to me, but not a bully,” WDRB's Lamb said. “Most of the time, he was very friendly and supportive. It would be true that he and I have not seen eye to eye on every issue in the past, but he always fought fairly and I never felt bullied or intimidated. 

“It is important to note, just because we didn’t agree doesn’t mean I was right, so I don’t judge him on the times we didn’t see eye to eye. I judged him on the overall job he did at U of L, which I believe was unmatched.” 

Jim Host, who negotiated the university's KFC Yum Center lease on behalf of the Arena Authority, said former football players were often more difficult to deal with than athletic directors who had come from other sports. In Jurich, a Northern Arizona University kicker good enough to be drafted by the Pittsburgh Steelers, Host saw the same hard-nosed approach he encountered with former Texas football coach Darrell Royal and former Arkansas coach Frank Broyles. 

“He would take it to the wall,” Host said. “A lot of people wouldn’t take that very well. ... But I always felt strongly that he was negotiating every way he could on behalf of his school. I did the same for the Arena Authority. Sometimes those trains wouldn’t meet.”

Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer came into conflict with Jurich over an initiative to pursue an NBA franchise and in efforts to revise U of L’s lease at the KFC Yum Center. He said he never had to wonder about Jurich’s priorities.

“He played first and foremost for University of Louisville athletics,” Fischer said, “and that’s what he saw as his job.”

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Was he a bully? That might depend on your definition. According to a document posted on U of L’s website, workplace bullying “refers to repeated, unreasonable actions of individuals (or a group) directed toward an employee (or a group of employees), which is intended to intimidate and creates a risk to the health and safety of the employee(s).”

“I don’t think bullying is a correct term,” WKRD-790’s Howie Lindsey said. “Any time I ever saw him crossways with members of the media, he reacted as if someone had offended his child or someone had taken an affront at something he had worked extremely hard at. Much like a papa bear, if you went after one of his family, he viewed it as part of his job to set the record straight.”

'That was a setup'

In hindsight, Jurich says, the record should be revised to show men's basketball coach Rick Pitino probably placed too much trust in his assistant coaches. In hindsight, Jurich says, he should have seen a troubling pattern when pizza mogul "Papa John" Schnatter went public in April at a board of trustees meeting with the provocative statement: "You cannot fix this university until you get a handle on athletics." 

"That was a setup," Jurich said. "He didn’t know what he was saying. He’s probably a brilliant man — I’m not saying that (he's not). It came out of his mouth, but it didn’t come out of his mouth. That was all a script. You could put all the pieces together, all the way back to March. It all fits now."

Jurich declined to identify who might have influenced Schnatter's statements but said he did not sense a problem last year when Gov. Matt Bevin decided to overhaul a board of trustees chaired by Benz, a Jurich ally, with a new group headed by Grissom. 

"Maybe that's just me being naive," he said. "I didn't know David Grissom."

Forty-five minutes before the board meeting of Oct. 18, during which he was fired by a 10-3 vote, Jurich said he received a phone call from Bevin.

"He told me, 'You’re the greatest athletic director of all time,'" Jurich said.

Bevin's spokesman could not be immediately reached Monday morning for comment on the call.

Given his accomplishments, and despite his detractors, Jurich is likely to find a lucrative place to land. Vish, Jurich's friend and adviser, said he expects the former AD's differences with Louisville will likely be settled through mediation rather than a contentious court battle. Jurich said he will not be taking any calls about other jobs for the time being.

“We want to get our affairs in order here, do all that, go through our legal work to do all that,” he said. “We’ve been planning the last couple of years, the last three years, to downsize. We’ve got too much house for me and her and the dog. We’ll probably find a smaller place.”

He said he was in no hurry to find a new challenge, and he rejected the notion that he would be “starting over” at an age when other men are contemplating retirement.

“I don’t call it starting over,” he said. “I think there’s going to be lots of opportunities to look at things. I don’t know if I’ll do college athletics. There are a lot of opportunities that are coming at Bob (Gunnell) that are kind of exciting.

“The future is real bright.”

Tim Sullivan: 502-582-4650; tsullivan@courierjournal.com; Twitter: @TimSullivan714. Support strong local journalism by subscribing today: www.courier-journal.com/tims