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What shaped new Ohio State athletic director Ross Bjork? Ohio roots and a bad helmet
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- What shaped new Ohio State athletic director Ross Bjork? Ohio roots and a bad helmet
Look closely at Ross Bjork's forehead, he said, and the scar probably remains.
Ohio State's incoming athletic director was a fullback at Division II Emporia State in the 1990s. Let's just say the Hornets' equipment was not cutting edge. Their helmets had knobs that broke through the thin interior padding during collisions. Oh, and were there collisions.
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Emporia State coach Larry Kramer was an All-American offensive lineman at Nebraska. He prided himself on coaching tough-guy football.
"He actually looked very similar to Woody Hayes," Bjork said. "He's got the glasses. He wore the hat. It's almost identical to Woody Hayes, and he had a very similar demeanor. He was hard-nosed, hard-core.
"We would practice three hours on a Thursday. We would literally be yelling at him, 'Coach, we play a game in less than 48 hours! We've got to get off the field. We're dead.' (He'd say), 'I don't care. Run it again.' "
Back then, players were coached to lead with their heads when blocking. The knob that broke through the padding would cut into Bjork's forehead and leave a bloody gash.
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"Because you're wearing a helmet five days a week, it would never heal, so blood's (constantly) running down," he said.
Reuben Rice was Bjork's position coach at Emporia State. He said Bjork was everything you wanted in a fullback.
"Our fullbacks were going to put their nose on a linebacker about 35 times a game," Rice said. "They might get the ball four or five times a game, but their job was to put their nose in the middle of a linebacker and try to create space for a tailback."
Bjork, 51, has progressed up the ranks in athletic administration since those humble roots. He officially takes over for the retired Gene Smith on Monday. But much of Bjork's success is rooted in what he learned banging helmets at Emporia State.
Mar 5, 2024; Columbus, OH, USA; Ohio State athletic director Gene Smtih stands beside his replacement, Ross Bjork, during the first spring practice at the Woody Hayes Athletic Center.
"I think it's just the straight-ahead mentality," Bjork said. "What you see is what you get. Hey, that's a problem, that's a challenge. Go hit it head-on. That's what fullbacks do, right?
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"You're unselfish. You don't care who gets the credit. You're humble about the approach. You have to work hard. If you don't work hard at that position, you'll get exposed really quick. You have to have a positive attitude about it. Then playing for the guy I played for – just the toughness. Nothing will faze you because if you went through that, you can get through anything."
Ross Bjork's Dodge City roots
Bjork grew up in Dodge City, Kansas, which is perhaps most famous as the setting for the old television Western, "Gunsmoke."
But his mother's roots are in Ohio. Linda Bjork grew up on a family farm raising cattle and crops in Williamstown, south of Findlay in the northwest part of the state. She said the farm was in the family from around 1860 until it was sold about a decade ago.
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At his introductory press conference in January, Ross Bjork talked about the 18-hour drives his parents and older sister, Christine, took to visit his grandparents' farm. He'd get excited when he heard the tires on a gravel road because that meant they were close.
Jan 17, 2024; Columbus, OH, USA; Ross Bjork speaks during an introductory press conference for Ohio State University’s new athletic director at the Covelli Center.
Ohio State sports were a part of the family's life.
"I'm a big Buckeye fan," Linda Bjork said. "All of us in our family have been. The only time I wouldn't be is if Ohio State basketball was playing (Kansas). Then I might have to weigh the odds."
Though until now he has never lived in Ohio, Ross Bjork has felt like a Buckeye at heart.
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"Every family gathering, every time I'd be around my mom and dad in my adult life or we'd get one of her brothers on the phone, we always talked about Ohio in some way, shape, or form," he said. "There's always been a deep connection to the family farm. My grandparents were sort of all that it centered around – just family and faith and gathering."
Bjork was an excellent student and popular kid. Linda Bjork said her son protected classmates who were bullied. She remembers him in junior high admonishing a student for putting thumbtacks on another kid's chair.
Sports were a huge part of Bjork's childhood. He played basketball and baseball as well as football.
"I was always riding my bike somewhere to play a game," he said.
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Dodge City had about 25,000 people, and it felt like everyone knew everyone. High school football was huge.
"It was Friday Night Lights," Bjork said.
Mar 5, 2024; Columbus, OH, USA; Ohio State Buckeyes head coach Ryan Day talks to incoming athletic director Ross Bjork during the first spring practice at the Woody Hayes Athletic Center.
Bjork was a quarterback until high school before switching to fullback. He attended Dodge City Community College for two years because he said he was "too prideful" to accept a walk-on offer at Kansas State.
At Dodge City and Emporia, Bjork quickly became a team leader because of his people skills and work ethic.
"He worked extremely hard," said Brian Hill, an Emporia teammate, "so he gained a lot of respect in the way he prepared. He was always the first guy there and the last guy to leave. But he was also a guy that was able to communicate with and inspire his teammates. When you transfer from junior college, it's kind of tough to make inroads as a leader, but Ross did it right away."
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Dewayne Seau was his teammate at both Dodge City and Emporia.
"He was very meticulous and methodical in everything he did," he said. "I was a nose guard. Ross would say if a play was not right, 'Can we go over this play again?' He had to have things right."
Seau couldn't find anyone in town to cut his hair properly and was told that Bjork could do it.
"He was my barber in college," he said with a laugh. "He was really good. I never used anybody but him."
Ross Bjork: Man on the rise
Bjork might have been a barber on the side, but he knew then he wanted to pursue sports administration as a career. Emporia didn't offer that as a major, so he and his advisor crafted a de facto one by having him major in recreation administration with a minor in business.
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Through a connection with a friend, he got an internship with the Albuquerque Dukes minor-league baseball team as a professional start. Bjork got his master's degree from Western Illinois and then got his first job as a fundraiser in the Western Kentucky University athletic department in 1996.
Bjork was a natural as a fundraiser, which became a hugely important skill as spending in college athletics rose.
"In fundraising, there's a little bit more to it than most people might think," said Dr. Gary Ransdell, who as WKU president would give Bjork his first athletic director job in 2010. "It's work, and it's confidence. You've got to not only build relationships, but you have to make the ask and you have to close the gift. That comes down to faith, trust and leadership, and Ross exudes trust and confidence in the leadership he provides."
Bjork said there's no secret to being successful in fundraising. It's about developing those relationships and articulating a vision.
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"Do people believe in you?" he said. "Do they like you? Do you lay out a vision? Then you've got to be organized. You have to follow up. You have to make the right kinds of proposals."
Reuben Rice, his Emporia position coach, said he believes Bjork would have been a success on the reality show "Survivor," not for being cutthroat, but because of his ability to form alliances.
"Building trust and being honest with people, even when that honesty is being critical, I just think he knows how to do that," Rice said.
The University of Missouri was one of Bjork's stops on his way up the ladder. It was there in 1999 that he met his wife, Sonya. She was a small-college volleyball player who loves sports. They immediately hit it off.
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Bjork told her in their second conversation that he wanted to be an athletic director, and that if they were to have a future together, she'd have to be willing to move frequently. They got married in 2002 and have moved six times since. They have two sons, Paxton and Payton.
Ross Bjork navigates bumps in the road
It has been a steady uphill climb for Bjork, but there have been notable bumps in the road. At Mississippi, Bjork faced intense criticism for the way an NCAA violations scandal involving football coach Hugh Freeze was handled before Freeze was finally fired after calls to escorts were revealed. At Texas A&M, Bjork signed off on a contract extension in 2021 for coach Jimbo Fisher that left the school liable for a record $77 million buyout when Bjork fired Fisher last year.
Bjork accepts the scrutiny as part of his high-profile position.
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"This is not the most important thing that happens on our campus," he said of athletics, "but it's the most visible, so when something happens, it gets magnified. To me, it's not a matter of if but when we're all going to be tested.
"I'll be tested here at Ohio State. There's something that's going to test us, whether it's a coaching search that you didn't expect or whatever. To me, it's how you handle it. How do you respond? How do you process it? How do you communicate with the right people?
"You never want to surprise your supervisors, your bosses, your boards. You learn to be brutally honest with people. If we're going to deal with it, let's deal with it now because we'll have to deal with it eventually."
Bjork said that when he was younger he took emotion more into consideration when making hard decisions. Now, he said, his guiding principle is to do what's best for the institution.
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"In these environments, you have to be steady, you have to be thoughtful and thorough and do the right thing by the person, but also make sure you protect the institution," Bjork said.
Those who knew Bjork way back when are not surprised that he has become the athletic director at a school like Ohio State. They recognized his intelligence, people skills, fundraising acumen and determination.
Ransdell, the former Western Kentucky president, first met Bjork in a hotel workout room when Bjork was a fundraiser for the University of Miami. In a 10-minute conversation, he sensed Bjork was a young guy on the rise because of his confidence and charisma.
"You could tell he was informed about the whole world of intercollegiate athletics," Ransdell said. "You could tell this guy's got his act together."
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It was a long climb from that meeting for Bjork to reach Ohio State. When he called his mom in January to tell her he had gotten the job, she teared up with emotion. Even now, Linda Bjork gets choked up when recalling that conversation.
"I was thinking of my dad and his dad," she said. "They're not here to enjoy his success, but (they'd) be really proud of him."
And now Bjork's work here begins.
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: What shaped new Ohio State AD Ross Bjork? Ohio roots and a bad helmet
