a_hudy

Excited for this new chapter. I can’t express enough heartfelt gratitude to all that have impacted and supported my life and career.🤘🏽

August 16, 2019

Before we go into Jayhawk repercussions….

Congrats to the strength gawd Andrea Hudy for securing the💰at Texas. Very few athletic trainers—not to mention college basketball athletic trainers—become household names within the sport. But Hudy did, and the university that came calling has that cable money that KU could never compete with. Even without drilling down on how much of UT’s athletics revenue might spill back into Texas athletics’ staffing, Texas operates with at least double the budget of KU’s Athletic department.

Matt Tait says to relax, which is like… sure. Should we listen?

Hudy’s comp probably sits in the mid-six-figures now, possibly even commensurate with strength coaches in college football. When the LJ World obtained athletic department contract information in 2011, Hudy made $105k. That’s a long time ago, and she’s been with the program since 2004. Surely she had a few raises since then, hit contract incentives, accomplishments all buoyed by the support of Bill Self, who essentially had carte blanche with his staff throughout the whole Sheahon Zenger era. I figured that, if Hudy ever were to leave KU, it would be for pro basketball, where the money is great (the Lakers hired away the Kardashian’s trainer… that kind of money) and the hiring practices are much more progressive than other leagues. But Hudy left for a program in conference. Time to panic?

I have a suspicion about how Bill Self feels about this, even with the new oversight arrangement between KU and their health services partner. KU hoops will move on without Hudy in the short term; I bet those SporTrac machines are hard to move. It could be that there’s a 12-18 month halo post-Hudy where we’ll get along fine enough following her programs.

But what happens after that?

What Jeff Long does to replace Hudy will be telling. Will he actually pick up the phone and try and poach a well-respected strength coach from another program, or even possibly an assistant strength coordinator from the NBA who could use some resume padding before a director promotion? Or will he call some guy he kind of knew at Arkansas? Zenger left basketball alone while he spent his energy breaking football—will Long be the same way?

I have a suspicion about all that, also. Stay tuned. I hope Hudy buys a Tesla.