Phillips optimistic despite FSU, Clemson lawsuits
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Andrea Adelson, ESPN Senior Writer
AMELIA ISLAND, Fla. — ACC commissioner Jim Phillips said Wednesday the pending litigation with Florida State and Clemson is “disruptive” and “harmful” but it has not changed the dynamic between them as the league wrapped up three days of meetings.
Phillips and league representatives, including athletic directors, football coaches and men’s and women’s basketball coaches met to discuss a big list of topics — including a possible settlement in the House vs. NCAA case, CFP expansion, revenue distribution and changing the perception around the league.
But with Florida State, Clemson and the ACC engaged in lawsuits against each other over the league’s withdrawal penalty and grant of rights, uncertainty continues to hang around the league as it charts a new course with three new members joining in the fall. Cal, Stanford and SMU also participated in the league meetings.
Phillips acknowledged what remains ongoing with Clemson and Florida State, saying, “It’s difficult, it’s disruptive, it’s harmful but that’s the world we live in. It hasn’t changed one iota about how we’ve interacted with them and it shouldn’t.”
It should be noted Clemson and Florida State were full participants in the meetings over the past three days. Florida State athletic director Michael Alford said Tuesday the meetings were “cordial.” When asked if their future in the league could be salvaged, Alford said, “We’ll just wait for that to play out.”
Asked the same question Wednesday about salvaging a future with Florida State and Clemson in the league, Phillips said, “You have to stay optimistic, and you work through these things. I don’t know where it’s going to go. But I will continue to remain optimistic about our league … and I won’t ever change until somebody else tells me differently. Am I going to fight and protect the ACC? Absolutely. I have to do that. That’s my responsibility. So we’ll see where it goes.”
Clemson and Florida State have specifically pointed to a mounting revenue gap with the Big Ten and SEC as reasons their future in the league is untenable. But Phillips said the ACC has worked to address those issues, including full distribution of the ACC Network and success initiatives that reward on-field success.
“If we’re chasing money, then we’re chasing money,” Phillips said. “But I believe we’re also trying to chase success. And so if it’s just a money issue, which no one can show me that money equates success, you can maybe show me some examples, but I can show you some examples also, where schools have done really well on the national scene with some less revenue.”
That revenue gap will grow further in the expanded 12-team CFP, with the SEC and Big Ten set to earn a larger share of that revenue pie. North Carolina coach Mack Brown said Tuesday he was “disappointed” that money will not be equally distributed.
Phillips said Wednesday when the final breakdown was made over CFP appearances, the ACC was slotted in 17 to 18%.
“I felt like I negotiated hard, just like every conference did and we got to a place that at the end of the day, ‘Do you love it?’ You don’t love it, but it certainly was better than where we started, and it’s more than we’ve ever had relative to CFP dollars. But I again understand it causes even a greater gap.”
Phillips said it was imperative to get more than one team into the CFP, and addressed trying to change the perception surrounding the way the league has performed in football.
“We have to try to change that, and we’re determined to do that,” he said.
As for the settlement talks in House vs. NCAA, Phillips said he could not get into specifics because too many unknowns remain about what the final dollars will look like. But the ACC presidents and chancellors will meet next week in Charlotte, North Carolina, for their spring meetings to discuss the issue further.
He also noted that the league has been able to find success across the board, with five national titles so far in this athletics season, and does not want that to get overshadowed with what is playing out in courtrooms across three states.
“These cases are going to take a little while,” Phillips said. “We’ll have to work through them. We have 10,000 student athletes that are really doing well that are performing at the highest level. I hope that we don’t lose sight of while all this is going on, the conference continues to do really well. We’ll manage what we have to manage.”
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Joey Logano wondered Tuesday if Baseball Hall of Famer Chipper Jones ever had driven a race car at Talladega after the former Atlanta Braves slugger criticized the NASCAR champion in a series of social media posts.
Jones was defending Austin Cindric, the winner of Sunday’s race at Talladega Superspeedway, after Team Penske teammate Logano unleashed an expletive-laden rant about Cindric around the halfway mark of the race. Logano was furious he did not receive the help he needed from Cindric, which allowed rival Toyota driver Bubba Wallace to win the second stage and earn valuable bonus points.
“Way to go, Austin. Way to go. You dumb f—. Way to f—ing go,” Logano said on his team radio. “What a stupid s—. He just gave it to him. Gave Toyota a stage win. Nice job. Way to go. What a dumbass.”
Jones was angered by Logano’s rant and in six social media posts congratulated Cindric, called Logano selfish and celebrated Logano being disqualified for failing postrace inspection.
“Good teammates are hard to come by, Boss! Remember that one of urs MFed u on national tv, when in all actuality, u did everything possible to keep from wrecking him,” Jones wrote. “Some people are ‘hooray for our team as long as I’m the star’ as every team has them. Hendrick, RCR, JGR, Penske, etc. Sometimes karma is glorious.”
When told of Jones’ comments on a Tuesday appearance of SiriusXM NASCAR Radio’s “The Morning Drive,” Logano said he was unaware of them. Once he was told, Logano asked: “Has Chipper Jones ever driven a race car at Talladega? That would be my first question. I’m pretty certain he hasn’t.”
“That’s like me saying something about baseball. I know nothing about baseball,” Logano said. “That’s like me saying something that he did something in baseball that was wrong. That doesn’t matter.”
“Chipper Jones, he seems like a cool dude, he’s done a lot, right? He’s a pretty popular, good baseball player, but he’s not a race car driver, and I know he wasn’t in the room with us when we set in place the way things are supposed to go.”
Joey Logano on SiriusXM
Logano continued by saying that as a former professional athlete, Jones should understand there was more to the situation than what he saw on television. Jones grew up outside Daytona International Speedway and was once the grand marshal for the Daytona 500.
“Chipper Jones, he seems like a cool dude, he’s done a lot, right? He’s a pretty popular, good baseball player, but he’s not a race car driver, and I know he wasn’t in the room with us when we set in place the way things are supposed to go,” Logano said. “You would think somebody that has been in professional sports and has been in meetings like that would probably take a step back and say, ‘Man, there’s probably more to the story here than what there is.’ I’m surprised it went that way. Maybe he was just bored. I don’t know what his situation is. I tell you I don’t care.”
Logano said he and Cindric cleared the air in Penske’s Monday meeting.
“Austin and I talked about it. We’ve got to move forward. That’s what it is,” he said. “I explained my side. He understood. We move on. There’s no sense in airing our dirty laundry and airing out what the actual rules are because that’s private information that doesn’t need to be out to everybody. But the facts are that what we set in place wasn’t happening and that’s why I got frustrated. Like I said, we talked about it and we moved on.”
Logano did acknowledge that he probably should not have hit the radio button and “spouted off so much.”
“Probably blew up into a little bigger situation than it needed to, but the conversation, either way, needed to happen. Just more people are talking about it now,” he added.
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