LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Josh Heird preferred not to be introduced Friday as the University of Louisville athletic director. On Heird’s calendar, next Tuesday or Wednesday would have been the proper day for him to scrub the word "interim" off his job title.
But news never stays bottled up in today’s media world. The secret escaped. The announcement was moved up. Heird’s introduction was signed, sealed and delivered by 9:15 a.m. Friday, nearly five hours ahead of what Heird wanted to matter more this weekend.
At U of L, the buzz should be about another push by Dan McDonnell’s Cardinals’ baseball team in the NCAA Tournament regional at Jim Patterson Stadium.
In Heird’s mind, it is the University of Louisville, not the University of the Athletic Director.
Keep the spotlight on the athletes and coaches. Keep the athletic director in Row 2.
I’m not here to mention any names from the Frustrated Forty Louisville "fans" and business leaders who tried to undercut Heird’s career-defining introduction by releasing a letter Thursday criticizing the hire and stumping for former athletic director Tom Jurich.
There’s no reason to do that. The critics failed.
Heird looked big enough for the job and has looked that way for months. His critics looked small while trying to make a mess when a mess was unnecessary.
The right man got the job. Heird has done the right things since he took over from Vince Tyra in December.
He’s said the right things along his interim and introductory journeys, especially Friday. Heird became emotional while starting his news conference by thanking his wife, Abbey, for taking care of their family — especially daughter, Hadley, and son, Gus — during the countless hours he worked while bringing stability to the messy U of L men’s basketball program with no guarantee Heird would be the pick for the permanent job.
Louisville athletic director Josh Heird answered questions as his wife, Abbey, and daughter, Hadley, watched Friday morning. WDRB Photo Rick Bozich
If you don’t believe new coach Kenny Payne has been the most important person in the life of the Heird family since late January, then you didn’t see the scene that I saw outside the news conference at the University Club.
As Payne drove away from the building, he was spotted by Abbey Heird and her two young children. The kids spotted Payne before he rolled down his window.
Immediately they began shrieking, jumping and yelling, "It’s Kenny Payne! It’s Kenny Payne! Kenny Payne! Kenny Payne!"
Payne stopped his car and exchanged high fives with those three members of the Heird family. Payne had already made certain the people who mattered at the University of Louisville understood he endorsed working with Heird while trying to rebuild Cardinal basketball.
During the hiring process, Payne and Heird bonded over their ties in Mississippi. Heird started his college career at Jones County Community College in Ellisville, less than 9 miles from Laurel, where Payne grew up.
The uncertainty about the nonsense churning around the U of L athletic program was a primary question Payne needed answered before he agreed to leave the New York Knicks to return to his alma mater. Heird eliminated that uncertainty. He sold Payne on his vision to bring Cardinal basketball out of its current darkness.
"I was very impressed (the first time he met Heird)," Payne said. "I’ve been fortunate to spend time with athletic directors. A bunch of them.
"There are qualities that you look for. And that’s more than just the accomplishments.
"Who are they as a person? Are they humble? Do they have integrity? He fit the mold right off the bat with his personality and what he is as a person. He’s going to be successful. Very successful."
Payne was not the only coach who attended Heird’s introduction. Head football coach Scott Satterfield and a van full of his assistant coaches were there to shake Heird’s hand. So were women’s basketball coach Jeff Walz, swimming coach Arthur Albiero and at least eight other U of L head coaches as well as former Cardinal athletes Darrell Griffith, Tony Branch, Robbie Valentine, Stephan Van Trease and Ryan McMahon.
They understand that at Louisville, the focus must turn to the 2023, 2024, 2025, 2026 and 2027 seasons (the length of Heird’s five-year, $850,000-per-year contract) not what did or did not happen in 2015 or 2017.
Heird handled the questions about his critics better than the critics of his hiring handled the news that Heird earned the job. He said he admired their passion and that they were welcome in the Cardinal family. He credited Jurich for bringing him to Louisville in 2007 and Tyra for bringing him back three years ago.
He praised Villanova men’s basketball coach Jay Wright as well as Nova AD Mark Jackson. From Jackson, Heird learned a defining lesson about treating people with dignity and respect.
A tireless runner, Heird accepted the Villanova job on the telephone while running the loop at Cherokee Park. He said that Jackson’s first words to him after he took the job was that Jackson would fire him if he was ever mean to anybody in the Villanova athletic department.
Heird has sold tickets, directed postseason events, administered facilities, raised money and checked the boxes that athletic directors must check in the ultra-competitive world of Power Five college sports.
He wants to win national titles — in more than men’s basketball.
But Heird spoke like a man who understood this is about the University of Louisville, not the University of the Athletic Director. For Heird, the opening line of the job description is making sure the women and men who come to the Louisville campus enjoy a fulfilling and successful experience — and leave with a degree.
"We’re going to do everything we can to make sure everybody in the city — anybody associated with this brand, with this university — feels good about what we’re doing on this campus," Heird said. "I think if we can show that, everybody will be on board."
Then Heird invited everybody to Patterson Stadium this weekend. Louisville has an NCAA baseball regional to win.
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