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ROSEMONT, Illinois – Kevin Warren keeps a photo of Curt Flood in his office. There is another member of Jackie Robinson, one of the basketball teams at the 1966 NCAA championship with the Texas Western Dam Tomb Cup and Dr. Martin Luther King's letter from "Letter from Birmingham Jail".
Warren understood the importance of the moment on Tuesday as he became the first black commissioner of a Power Five conference. The Big Ten hired the leader of the Minnesota Vikings to replace Jim Delany. A former basketball player and sports agent with a law degree from Notre Dame will lead one of the country's most lucrative leagues.
"It's really about diversity, inclusion and opportunity," said Warren. "One of the things I will defend here is to make sure that whatever your background – regardless of race, color, creed, gender, ethnicity or sexual orientation – it will be an exclusive place which will welcome everyone and give everyone the opportunity to be the best possible.
He will start on September 16th and will work alongside Delany, who will step down on January 1st. Delany, 71, has announced his decision to retire this year.
This is not the first pioneering role for Warren, 55 years old. He is the chief of Vikings operations since 2015, the first African-American to hold this position for an NFL franchise. And now comes another milestone among the Power Five, which includes the Southeast, Pac-12, Big 12 and Atlantic Coast Conferences.
"Do I think about it every day? Yes, said Warren.
"But I also remember that it gave me the opportunity to send back the elevator to allow people – other people may not have given the opportunity to people who would look like – in remembrance. And to make sure that I play at the highest level possible to open the door to the next person, regardless of their color. "
Indiana President Michael McRobbie said the Big Ten had examined more than 60 candidates.
Warren became emotional during the press conference, especially when he spoke about his parents and the late SEC commissioner, Mike Slive.
He remembered a mutual friend who had organized a meeting with Slive in the early 1990s at The Palmer House in Chicago – the famous hotel where the Big Ten and the brownies invented in the 1890s were born. he was returning to South Bend, Slive had left a message on his answering machine proposing to work for his law firm, where he had started working on NCAA crime cases.
Warren is also reminded of the difficult obstacles that he had to face just to get back to walking after being knocked over by a car. Barely 11 years old, the kid who grew up in Phoenix was cycling with friends that summer day.
He heard paramedics tell him that he might not, but he found himself in traction, then made a cast with a fractured right femur and a fractured wrist. While he was preparing to leave the hospital, a doctor told him that swimming would give him the best chance of recovery even if the odds were not good.
Warren persuaded his parents to use part of his $ 30,000 settlement to install a pool in the yard, arguing that community pools are not open every day and that they might not always be able to take him there. The future lawyer defended his case so well that he had one for $ 11,000, a decision that will change their lives for their son.
"When you are actually paying for something, you enjoy it more," said Warren, who rescued his mutilated Schwinn until the movers threw it after his father's death. "For me, at age 11, officially write the check on something like that. … It made me mature very young. And it saved my life.
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