Everything Warde Manuel said on the Conqu'ring Heroes podcast

On what he's seen from Michigan athletics this year

I would use the term, "Amazing." With everything that we have gone through, and everything your listeners have gone through, for the last couple of years. To see us return to normal activity, for the most part, and to see how hard the men and women, our coaches and staff, have worked throughout. It's almost like coming out of a tunnel and you're ready to roll. Coming out of the chute as an offensive or defensive linemen, ready to make the tackle or ready to make the hit. It's just been amazing. That's what I continue to tell people. 13 conference championships, 12 in the Big Ten, and 1 in water polo. To be capped off with 13th in baseball after them persevering the way they did in the regular season. To win the season against Rutgers, to even get into the Big Ten Tournament. Then, to do what they did to beat the top four teams, just epitomized the year that we had. Some teams had to persevere like baseball. Some teams had to endure a tough loss on the road like we did in football and then have a tremendous win at home to end the season. Those things, I think, along the way, every step along the way, the word that continues to come in my mind for a while now has been amazing. I don't use it because we're maize and blue amazing, it's amazing because it's amazing. It happens to be amazing for maize and blue. I love that.

On having fans back in the stadium

It was unbelievable. You were there at the stadium, we were on opposite sides, the year we had no fans. That was really, really eery. We allowed parents to come in towards the end. Brought back a little normalcy but not much. Coming back and welcoming our fans, going through the year, even into the summer, not knowing if we were only going to be allowed a percentage or part, 50% or 75%. Turns out we were able to allow 100% by the time the games started. The excitement level, everybody wanting to come back together. Many still in mask. Some that chose not to come back last season, hopefully, we'll welcome back this season. For me, just a lot of joy to see people walking around. To see tailgating. To actually be stuck in traffic, that was amazing. Just to see the joy of people getting back together with their friends. You don't realize until it's gone, how much I do it as athletic director, you do it as a radio host now, our former teammates come back and we get to see them. Either the Friday night before the game, maybe quickly the day of the game. Definitely, after the game, after we're finished. Just to see the joy on so many people's faces as you ride in. You notice the hugs. Some of the hugs I've noticed on my way around the stadium or walking through tailgating areas, you know they were I miss you. I missed seeing you, particularly during those first couple of games where you would see people embrace each other with an enthusiasm unknown to mankind. It was just terrific to see and I was glad everybody came back.

On where the athletic department is coming out of the pandemic

We ended last year, we had projected early on that we were going to be somewhere around $80-90 million in debt. Thankfully, for the work of our coaches, the Big Ten's work in terms of driving television and trying to make up games that were lost and those kind of things, we ended up $51 million in debt after last year and going into this year. We were able to, through much of the generosity, and that also includes the generosity of our season ticket holders and donors who donated either their money from their season tickets or additional dollars, chose that option. To our staff, who took on a great burden of a reduction in salary. All the things we did to pull together. We came out of it, and this year, we were able to use the reserve funds that we had. We had a small loan to pay back to the university. In the end, this year we came out—and a lot of great work by our staff and our coaches and my administrative staff. We came out, I believe, we're going to be in the black by about $800,000. We still have the loan to pay off and we still owe on that, about $5 million. But, the big news is, for us, that we were able to really pull together. Our season ticket holders, and our donors, in particular, to help us through the past couple of years. My staff did an unbelievable job. They really pulled together. For me, there's a lot of tough times for many people, individually and collectively as a business. There were a lot of people who came to our aid, they helped. You look at what Jim and Sarah Harbaugh did to help the staff by not taking the bonus and supporting them with a return of the money that they gave back to the department. I was able to make the decision to give it back to them based on his decision. There were a lot of great people to mention. I believe the final number was something between donating the money from the season tickets that were lost in that season, suite tickets and the like, and additional donations, it was in the neighborhood of about $5 or 6 million. That helped make a huge difference where we were and what we could do for our staff. I'm so thankful for having our fans back but I'm also thankful for the way that everybody came together in that particular year-and-a-half, almost two-year stretch.

On changes made during the pandemic within the athletic department that will continue moving forward

Football tickets are still going to be hard tickets unless they opt out into digital tickets. You have many that still do that, they frame them and put them in different places. Tradition comes to mind, it's a tradition amongst our fans. Technology has allowed us to do it. I think our fans have adjusted to it because a lot of pro sports do it. They do it a lot for concerts and the like. People find it an easier way to transfer their tickets as opposed to having a hard ticket where they have to leave at the ticket office, go through the whole thing. It's made it much simpler and easier for our fans. And more convenient. Some things we can do that can help the convenience of our fans and customers, we will certainly continue to do. That goes into recruiting and using Zoom, meeting parents and having those kind of calls with coaches and having that first connection live as opposed to over the phone or a letter. There's a lot of good things that have come out of this pandemic that we will continue to use and utilize. The communication that occurred and how we communicate, we're learning more and more about the best ways to reach our customers and our fans. I think that's important for us to do, again, for their convenience, the ease of the messaging. We'll continue to strive to learn and push what's best, to sort of marry the convenience with the information so that our fans will be happy and continue moving forward.

On expecting more from his head coaches after a successful athletic year

We set the record, the original record was 11 in 2004. We've hit it a couple times, tied it a couple of times the last four or five years. Here's the thing that our fans know or should know, I am very competitive and want our teams to be successful. To a coach, to a player when they're playing, they're more competitive and demanding of themselves than I can ever be. That's a good position to be in as an AD. Meaning, I don't have to build them up and convince them that winning is the right thing to do. If that's the issue, I need to make a change. They are some of the most competitive individuals. If you go back to when we played, the AD wasn't more competitive than me. I'm preparing all week to go into the game. I'm going to compete and I want to win because I've been practicing, I've been watching film and I've been lifting weights all summer. I want to win. So when I go around before the game and I'm talking to games and I'm saying good luck and let's go, get after them. They're like, oh, yeah, we are. Don't you worry. That's what I love. Our coaches, our student-athletes, our staff are locked in. They want to win for themselves, for the team, for Michigan. That means a lot to me to see that level of effort across the board. They're competitive with each other. Those coaches want to win so when we have our head coaches meeting, they want to be one of the 13 I talk about when we have that meeting. They are very competitive individuals and I love them. They care deeply about our student-athletes across the board. Academically, we're doing unbelievably well, which makes me even more proud of the athletic success that we're having. When you pair them together, first and foremost, give credit to our student-athletes for their effort. As you know, they have to do the work. They have to do the class work, they have to do the work on the fields of play, they have to get after it in both. I also give so much credit to our coaches for their recruitment and support of the staff and the academic staff, all the facility staff. Everybody that touches our success, which is virtually everybody in these buildings, I am immensely thankful for their work and their effort.

On how Michigan is handling NIL

It is something that I was a proponent of and wanted to have it succeed from the time they talked about it. To have the opportunity and to see some of the things our student-athletes are able to drive in terms of additional incomes for themselves, maybe for their families, from name, image and likeness has been awesome to see. Some of the things they're doing, some of the relationships they have with companies from around Ann Arbor, around the state, around the country and, quite frankly, some that are worldwide companies, has just been tremendous for me to see. It makes me extremely happy. It is one of those things that we will continue to push. We were the first school to offer jersey sales for our student-athletes in the sport of football. With the M Den, they partnered with our student-athletes to do that. We have two group license arrangements for our student-athletes with Influencer and BrandR. We have The Victors Exchange that our donors and businesses can go on to The Victors Exchange and pair up with our student-athletes. We're the largest in the country with that. For me, that means that our student-athletes have a lot of opportunities. It also comes with some of the negatives around influencing and inducing student-athletes and, simply, wanting to pay and put money in somebody's pocket who doesn't have any obligation to do something in return. For me, those are the things that we need to make sure, as we move forward, these are students who participate in athletics. These are not employees, they're not professionals. We're not giving them scholarships here at Michigan to just play sports. It's about being a student, being an athlete and being a great person and all that entails. You have to do it all. For me, I'm excited for the opportunities that we have. Yesterday, I saw that we have a student-athlete that's endorsing PING, which was great to see. Somebody showed me the social media. Things like that, to me, to see some of the work that our student-athletes are doing in the community. I just think over Thanksgiving, we had two of our football players who gave away, and took some of their NIL money, to provide turkeys and food for people in need. For me, when you see that, I felt pride in having those two young men, and there were others, who, I'm sure, did other things. That gave me great pride to see them use that money not only for themselves but for the betterment of the community. There's so many great things going on with NIL and how we're trying to help our student-athletes. Really, we're trying right now to pull everything together. The educational pieces, the opportunities that exist that I just talked about. To pull that all together and package it in a way that, to our student-athletes, it's clear we're here to support them and drive their success.

On the perception that Michigan is anti-collective

If collective means pooling money together and giving people money for just being a student-athlete at Michigan, I'm against it. If collective means providing opportunities and resources and pooling them all together, providing them to student-athletes and ensuring that they are doing something for that benefit, there's nothing I can do to stop it and I'm supportive of collectives that do things the right way. We are not in the inducement business here. I can't say anybody else has or has not. I let the general public and things that are out there in the general public be what it is. That's not what it should be about. That's not what a collective should be. A collective should be to put resources together. Be it jobs, be it opportunities for social media, signing, whatever people want to do. In order to participate in that and in order to receive anything, should have to do something for that just like anybody else. I'm excited for those opportunities for our student-athletes to have. I think, just today, the NCAA came out with some clarifications about what they're doing and they're still doing work on things and they're focused on inducements are not involved in these kind of things. For me, they're not employees. They are students who participate in athletics. They are, in some respects, if people want to understand it in this language. I don't see them as employees but they're paid. I was paid, you were paid. Our scholarship money was covered, our parents didn't have to pay for it. We lived in the dorms and we got money to live off-campus. There were things that were covered because we participated in athletics that we didn't have to come out, nor did our parents, have to come out of their pockets for. In the true sense of collective a paycheck, if that's the only way people see student-athletes and what they get, they're not employees. It always, to me, has to be about education. The collectives can help us and it can help us provide additional support as they're developed here at Michigan. I know there are a couple of collectives that are in development here. That, to me, is where we make sure that people are investing in these young people. Not just giving but investing in the long-term.

On collectives and the influence of recruiting

It's still against the rules in the NCAA for me to give you a dollar or more to come to the University of Michigan. That's outside of what the scholarship is. That's what I'm saying about inducements. If I'm using something to say I will guarantee you X, I'm going to guarantee them four years, right now, just in cost of attendance and scholarship funds, I'm probably around $80,000-plus for an out-of-state student. I'll guarantee you $320,000 in education for the next four years in support. That's not accounting anything else, that's strictly scholarship dollars, cost of attendance. I'll guarantee you $320,000. That's what we guarantee. I don't need additional inducements because that's against the rules. I can only give you my perspective on the way to move forward, that we will move forward. Once somebody get here, if there are collectives that are helpful in securing them jobs and different things that they do and the collectives pay them and everything is above board, I have no complain. No control. Nothing that I have in place. I would welcome that level after they get here. For a student-athlete to come and say, Mr. Manuel, this collective promised me X numbers of dollars and they haven't come through with the money yet. That's where I have an issue because that level of inducement is not what we do.

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