How MSU's Retention of Guskiewicz Affects Departure of Batt
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Michigan State got another round of big news on Monday.
The Spartans will hold onto president Kevin Guskiewicz, despite a previously announced move to Clemson. Guskiewicz and the school officially announced his decision to stay, and Clemson also confirmed that Guskiewicz had informed it that he would stick around at MSU.
The Impact on J Batt, MSU Athletics
Plenty of eyes quickly shifted towards athletic director J Batt in the wake of the news. Batt had been announced as Kentucky's new AD in mid-June, but had still kept going into work at Michigan State in the interim.
The reason for that is that Batt and Kentucky were essentially waiting out Guskiewicz. There was a clause in Batt's deal with MSU that would cut his buyout in half "in the event" that Guskiewicz was no longer the president at Michigan State. Even though Batt's move to Kentucky was spurred by Guskiewicz's initial decision to go to Clemson, Guskiewicz never technically left, and that clause never actually took effect.
Details of Batt's Buyout
This is the difference between Kentucky being on the hook for $2.5 million to get Batt and the Wildcats being on the hook for $5 million. Even if Batt wanted to come back --- Kentucky's own president has already said Batt has reaffirmed his commitment to UK --- it would probably be too late. His decision to leave is enough that MSU seems fine to go on without him.
How Kentucky and Michigan State approach this situation now will be interesting. Legally, the Spartans have a case to demand the full $5 million sum, but Kentucky had been assuming it would only be shelling out $2.5 million. Leverage is also on the Spartans' side, since Kentucky would probably rather pay the additional dollars than let Batt walk and restart its AD search.
MSU and Kentucky would also have the option to negotiate out a final number, but as said previously, the Spartans have leverage and the legal case on their side. Kentucky would argue that Guskiewicz had been formally announced as Clemson's next president as a reason for the clause to take effect, or at least a mitigating circumstance.
Michigan State would then probably point out that Guskiewicz was open about the possibility of remaining with the school in the transition period right away, and that Kentucky already had Batt officially listed as their athletic director online while Guskiewicz was still at MSU.
Regardless of what happens, the Spartans will have a new athletic director soon enough. Part of what makes the Guskiewicz news so big is that the gap between ADs should be much shorter now.
The school would've had to undergo the lengthy process of finding a new president before finding an athletic director if Guskiewicz had gone to Clemson. Now, Guskiewicz and the current administration can quickly get to work on finding an athletic director to replace Batt, which is a process that doesn't take as much time as finding a new president does.
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A 2025 graduate from Michigan State University, Cotsonika brings a wealth of experience covering the Spartans from Rivals and On3 to his role as Michigan State Spartans Beat Writer on SI. At Michigan State, he was also a member of the world-renowned Spartan marching band for two seasons.
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