Roy Kramer arrived at the Southeastern Conference at a time when college sports still moved at a regional pace and conference commissioners were not always seen as national architects.
Before long, Kramer was both.
As SEC commissioner from 1990-2002, Kramer helped guide decisions that changed the conference’s footprint and helped set a template other leagues eventually followed.
Yet when asked to name his greatest accomplishment, he didn’t point to a single headline move.
“Personally, I think the thing that I felt over the course of time was that we were able to develop a camaraderie, a loyalty, a pride in being a part of the conference,” Kramer said. “It was significant to be a part of the Southeastern Conference.”
“It didn’t matter whether it was Mississippi State or Georgia or Alabama or Kentucky or whoever it might be,” he said. “There was a feeling that we were special because we were a part of this conference.”
Arkansas: secrecy, a newspaper and a blunt question
Kramer often explained the SEC’s early-1990s expansion with the addition of Arkansas and South Carolina, as a controlled process driven by presidents who wanted to avoid provoking other leagues.
“They were very specific. We were not to call anybody,” Kramer told Jimmy Hyams on The Rewind on Full Disclosure. “They didn’t want us to invite people. They didn’t want other conferences to be upset, because we were calling people.”
To dodge speculation, the SEC announced it was studying the landscape. The intent, however, Kramer said, was to let schools come forward if they were serious.
“Within a week we heard from several schools,” he said, and Arkansas quickly stood out.
The first Arkansas meeting, Kramer said, was meant to be “all undercover,” arranged at an airport-area motel outside Memphis.
Instead when Kramer arrived, a colleague handed him that morning’s USA Today, which included an interview with Arkansas athletic director Frank Broyles discussing rumors of conference movement.
Kramer read it and wondered why they were meeting at all.
Later, when Kramer walked into the motel lobby, he saw television cameras everywhere.
He initially assumed the meeting had leaked.
It hadn’t.
The cameras, he said, were there for a pageant-related event, “a contest for the Miss Northern Mississippi” and “nobody knew who we were.”
When Broyles arrived, Kramer continued the story with Jimmy Hyams on The Rewind on Full Disclosure.
He said he confronted him with the story by tossing the paper across the table.
“I said, ‘Frank, why are we here?” Kramer recalled.
Broyles’ answer, Kramer said, cut straight through the public posturing: “‘Oh.’ he says ‘Don’t pay any attention to that,’” then, “he says, ‘Where do we sign?’”
Kramer said the SEC’s stance in expansion talks was consistent: no perks, no side arrangements.
“They came in as an equal member,” he said. “There were no special deals for anybody.”
What followed: a new SEC model, and a national ripple
Expansion created a 12-team SEC and opened the door to a conference championship game structure that would become a sport-wide staple. Kramer said leaders understood the possibility, even if it wasn’t the sole driver at first.
He later described how the championship race changed late-season football.
“We found out that late in the season we had as many in some years as six or seven teams with an opportunity to get into the conference championships,” Kramer said, giving more games meaning deeper into November.
The idea spread quickly.
“Within a couple of years all of them had a conference championship game,” Kramer said.
Kramer also became a key voice in the national postseason conversation,
He pitched a coordinated system to skeptics, including groups tied to the Rose Bowl’s traditions. One early meeting, he said, ended in silence.
“Not one single… I mean you could have heard a pin drop,” Kramer said. Eventually, he said, “they agreed to be a part of it.”
A current issue: what realignment can cost
In his later years, Kramer expressed his concern about how conference growth has stretched beyond regional logic.
“As long as the purpose you had in a conference was to bring sort of a regional group of schools together for competition we’ve lost that to a degree now,” he said. “I don’t feel it is healthy for the overall scene of competition.”
“When you start adding schools half way across the or all the way across the country I think you lose that,” Kramer said. “That’s the strength of college football has always been its Regional strength of competition.”
In the end, Kramer measured legacy by whether people felt they belonged to something bigger than themselves.
“The ability to bring people together in a way where they felt that I think is a source of some pride,” he said.
This article was brought to you by Jimmy Hyams’ interview with Roy Kramer on The Rewind on Full Disclosure.
