Wang’s Word: Athletic director will need to resolve department, conference and brand issues

Many people expected Dan Guerrero’s final exploit before the end of his contract as UCLA’s athletic director would be hiring Mick Cronin as the new men’s basketball coach in April.

They probably also thought – spoiler alert – that Grey Worm was going to die in the final season of “Game of Thrones.”

Sometimes life works in funny ways.

Guerrero’s current contract expires at the end of 2019 – but following Cronin’s introductory press conference April 10, Guerrero revealed that he and Chancellor Gene Block have talked about a potential extension.

Whether that extension comes to fruition or not, UCLA must make its expectations clear for whoever heads the J.D. Morgan Center next year.

Broadly speaking, there should be three key platforms that the Bruins’ future athletic director – or Guerrero if he signs another extension – should focus on: cleaning up the athletic department, standing up to Pac-12 Commissioner Larry Scott and the rest of the conference’s leadership and rebuilding UCLA’s brand.

The past couple of years have been downright ugly for UCLA Athletics, from Operation Varsity Blues to basketball players shoplifting in China to a recent Los Angeles Times report that people within the Morgan Center were aware of a cash-for-admissions scheme for years.

It’s time to get back on the ethical side of the tracks.

The next athletic director must prioritize absolute adherence to NCAA, University of California and school policies. More details about scandals may arise in the next couple of years given the scope of media attention on UCLA right now, but the new administration shouldn’t perpetuate any wrongdoing.

Critically, this rules out Senior Associate Athletic Director Josh Rebholz – who was one of the perpetrators in the cash-for-admissions scheme according to the LA Times – as a candidate to fill the position.

Secondly, the future athletic director should pressure Scott and the rest of Pac-12 leadership to catch up to the other Power Five conferences in terms of cash payouts to schools, reputation, quality of play and other metrics.

No reasonable person would expect the Pac-12 to topple the SEC in football or the ACC in men’s basketball, but one would assume that a conference with a stranglehold over an entire coast could at least match the Big Ten and Big 12 in terms of revenue.

Instead, the Pac-12 saw its revenue drop $12.5 million in the 2018 fiscal year and distributed about $31.3 million to each school, according to a tax return filed last month. The Big 12 and Big Ten reportedly distributed about $7 million and $23 million more, respectively, to all but two schools. Rutgers and Maryland received lesser cuts because of previous loans from the Big Ten.

The largest culprit for the difference is the Pac-12 Networks, which has been trampled and left in the dust by the other conferences’ gargantuan TV deals with mainstream networks. The Pac-12 has to deal with the ramifications of its failures to distribute the networks and reach its projected levels of revenue, but UCLA’s athletic director must publicly push for change instead of continuing to bolster Scott’s coffers.

The fact that the conference was unable to negotiate a deal with DirecTV to carry the Pac-12 Networks serves as an ominous warning that Scott may whiff yet again once the current TV rights agreements with ESPN and Fox expire in 2024.

As a confluence of these two factors, UCLA’s brand has suffered – this was a clear takeaway from the bungled men’s basketball coaching search whiffs that played out in the public sphere. The Bruins have not consistently been in the national spotlight since Ben Howland’s run of three consecutive Final Fours ended in 2008.

While the Wasserman Football Center and Mo Ostin Basketball Center represent a massive step in the right direction, UCLA needs to pool more resources toward upgrading facilities and resources for student-athletes, just like any other school does.

Jackie Robinson Stadium and the Rose Bowl could both use a nudge into the modern world of comfort and technology. The new student-athlete academic center is promising, but better mental health and nutritional services are arguably just as important.

And for a school that prides itself on athletics, UCLA fails to retain student turnout to home games. Obviously not everyone is interested in watching sports or has the free time to, but as the Lonzo Ball year showed, there is more than enough interest across campus to pack The Den.

A crucial priority should be to showcase more athletes to garner student interest. One example is that despite the fact that not that many students enrolled as gymnastics nuts, they still packed meets to see junior Kyla Ross, junior Madison Kocian and senior Katelyn Ohashi.

The new athletic director should lead the Morgan Center in spotlighting standout athletes in Olympic sports through social media and on campus – if students realize how dominant athletes like junior baseball pitcher Ryan Garcia and redshirt junior softball pitcher Rachel Garcia are, they will be more likely to become invested in a team.

As the longest-tenured athletic director in the Pac-12 with 16 years at the helm, Guerrero was the only one to pull in more than $1 million in salary for the 2017-18 academic year, according to The San Jose Mercury News.

It’s time UCLA and Block demand he performs up to that level of compensation by standing up for the four letters, or find someone else.

They must demand more from the head of the athletic department.

Long snapper’s unique role requires careful technique and a strong mentality

Aggressive traps and a stifling attack – that’s how Johnny Den Bleyker said he likes to play chess.

Set to graduate a year early and pursue a master’s degree, the junior long snapper for UCLA football has been playing chess since elementary school.

He took it up again this offseason when coach Chip Kelly brought in chess instructor Seth Makowsky for the quarterbacks and made chess lessons available for the whole team.

“Before coach Kelly got here, probably no one (played chess),” Den Bleyker said.

Not too many people understand his recherche role on the football field either.

“I still talk to a lot of close friends and family members, and they still don’t know what exactly a long snapper is,” Den Bleyker said. “It’s definitely an obscure and very specialized position.”

It may be obscure to the average sports fan, but not to the Den Bleyker household.

Den Bleyker said he credits his older brother Alex Den Bleyker for introducing him to baseball, basketball and football. Although they never formally competed against each other due to a five-year age difference, there were many informal contests of basketball in the driveway and baseball in the backyard, Alex Den Bleyker said.

Those competitions set the table for long snapping.

In high school, both brothers attended Rubio Long Snapping camps, which are organized by former UCLA long snapper Chris Rubio.

Much of the camp focuses on the technique of chucking a football between the legs, from locking the legs to following through with the arms and hitting the punter in the so-called “Rubio Zone” – the area between the armpits and from the lowest rib to midthigh.

“There’s a target and a scoring system of how many times (the snappers) hit it,” Rubio said. “At that point it goes competition-based. The first one who gets five points if they hit it in the red (area) of the target, or the yellow (area) of the target, they move on and advance.”

But there’s another level to the camps.

“They try to add a lot of pressure situations and see how you handle pressure,” Johnny Den Bleyker said. “A lot of it is learning how to conquer your mind at these camps, and just getting comfortable doing what you do.”

Rubio said that he walks up to some of the kids at his camp and whispers in their ears as they get ready to snap, to try to break their nerve or get them to laugh. His strategy is to make his camps more pressure-filled than an actual game.

“It takes a long time to really grasp how strong mentally you need to be because you just can’t make a mistake,” Rubio said. “(At UCLA), I remember I would practice with my eyes closed because then I thought to myself, ‘If I could do this with my eyes closed, eyes open is going to be simple.'”

The campers quickly learn that long snapping is more than a set of physical motions.

“Snapping is totally mental,” said Alex Den Bleyker, who long snapped at Washington State from 2011 to 2014. “You’re thinking about following through, you’re thinking about locking your legs. But it needs to be second nature.”

Malcolm Gladwell once famously declared that 10,000 hours of practice lead to mastery of a skill. The younger Den Bleyker said he’s only been snapping since eighth grade, while also playing other positions on the field.

Ergo, baby steps.

“For me, I try not to think at all,” said Johnny Den Bleyker. “I like to approach it like a fourth grader – how would they do it? And make it as simple as possible. Just throw the ball through your legs.”

Den Bleyker’s first game as a Bruin was at Texas A&M, a nationally televised contest that drew more than 100,000 spectators – a far cry from the couple hundred people he estimated showed up to his high school games.

And then there’s the pressure situations, such as game-winning field goal attempts in a stadium shaking with anticipation and fanatical screams.

Not that it affects Den Bleyker.

“I try to block everything out, but of course there’s always going to be some form of pressure,” he said. “The biggest thing is that I’m doing this for (rising senior kicker) JJ (Molson), I’m doing this for the guys on the sideline (and) the guys on the field. So no matter how much pressure there is, it won’t be enough.”

That composure was something Rubio spotted in Den Bleyker when he was a high school junior.

“He was very, very strong mentally, where he was one of those kids who could just relax and have a good time,” Rubio said. “He had one of those personalities where he didn’t overthink too much, and that helps out a lot. When a kid starts to think, they start to think, and that becomes a problem.”

Den Bleyker’s consistency helped him outlast several other long snappers at Rubio’s camps to earn an invitation to the All-American game, a process he called one of the most pressure-filled things he’s ever accomplished.

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Graduating junior long snapper Johnny Den Bleyker was invited to the high school All-American game after being noticed at the Rubio Long Snapping camps. At the camps, Den Bleyker said he was taught the more mental aspects of the position. (Kristie-Valerie Hoang/Daily Bruin senior staff)

And while UCLA’s special teams units have received a negative reputation in recent years for opponents’ long kick and punt returns, missed kicks, or other mishaps, Den Bleyker’s teammates said he shouldn’t be in that conversation.

“What (Den Bleyker) allows me to do is basically just worry about kicking the ball,” Molson said. “I know (the ball) is going to be there, so I can just go with no hesitation and just kick the ball. So to know that he’s so fine-tuned and technically sound and does well under pressure, that just takes so much (pressure) off my shoulders.”

The relationship between a long snapper, holder and kicker is as tight-knit as any on a football team because each serves as a cog in a machine.

Even if something does go wrong, the specialists don’t even wait to go back to the sideline before talking to each other. Den Bleyker said they’ll know almost immediately what happened, work on it a couple of times on the sideline and then resume their regular conversations.

If Den Bleyker fires off a bad snap, the culprit is easy to pinpoint.

“Nine times out of 10, it’s a confidence issue,” Rubio said. “It’s usually just the mental aspect that kills their form.”

But more often than not, Den Bleyker’s snaps hit the mark. Molson said that probably only one in 100 field goal misses is Den Bleyker’s fault.

Den Bleyker gets an additional incentive on fourth down if UCLA punts. Assuming the kick goes off without a hitch, he gets the opportunity to channel his past as a high school linebacker and, in his words, be an athlete on the field.

He has two career fumble recoveries and one career tackle. They represent a rare opportunity for his teammates to celebrate his physical achievements, which are made possible by his mental fortitude on long snaps.

In the grand scheme of things, Den Bleyker may seem like any other ordinary chess piece in Kelly’s arsenal. But to someone who’s been in a long snapper’s shoes, he could just as well be considered the king.

“On fourth down, we’re the only ones cheering,” Alex Den Bleyker said. “Everyone else is usually not too happy to punt or kick a field goal, but we’re happy because Johnny’s running onto the field.”

Senior signoffs: Izzy Carey looks back at athletic success and strength of sports camaraderie

When I was going through the volleyball recruiting process in high school, UCLA was the last school I looked at.

I wanted to go to a school away from my hometown of Westlake Village, California, but I remember emailing UCLA beach volleyball coach Stein Metzger a video of me playing because I figured I might as well check UCLA out.

I didn’t want to go to such a massive school, or one so close to home. UCLA didn’t have a beach-only coach or even beach-only players for that matter. The team practiced only twice a week and lost most games at the time. UCLA offered no scholarships, and the majority of the school didn’t seem to know there even was a beach volleyball program.

Despite all of that, I immediately loved something about UCLA and knew I wanted to be a Bruin.

I entered the UCLA Athletics world, what we like to call the “Bruin Bubble,” and suddenly any time I wanted to put in extra conditioning or more practice reps, there was always someone who wanted to join me. Many days were spent supporting other UCLA teams competing for conference and national titles.

Every day, I had the privilege of training alongside athletes whose names are known across the globe – in fact, three of my beach volleyball teammates have already gone on to start chasing Olympic dreams, and several of my friends on other teams have entered professional sports careers abroad.

This weekend, I get to meet up with a friend who graduated from UCLA water polo and has been playing in Italy while I’ve been in Dublin for an Irish Olympic qualifier. UCLA truly is a place of excellence.

And that’s not only in athletics.

Since I’ve been here, UCLA has been ranked as the No. 1 public institution in the U.S. and has been the most applied to school in the nation. We as students get the opportunity to learn from some of the most distinguished professors while studying alongside peers who will go on to make tangible impacts on the world we live in.

I am incredibly proud to be a UCLA Bruin and always will be.

I love John Wooden’s definition of success as being a peace of mind derived from self-satisfaction in your own effort. Regardless of outcomes these past four years, I am extremely satisfied with how UCLA positively shaped me into a woman with clear values, a better perspective of my place in the world and a strong pride in who I am.

But I’m not complaining that I also get to leave here with the satisfaction of saying that I am a back-to-back national champion, especially with the storybook ending of beating USC in my senior year final.

Go Bruins!

Carey competed for UCLA beach volleyball from 2016-2019.

Senior signoffs: Julia Hernandez reflects on empowering messages learned at UCLA

My road here has been a very unconventional one.

As a high school senior who barely knew any English, I decided to leave Spain to follow my dreams. From growing up in Spain, to a semester at a community college in Florida, to a one-day official visit to UCLA – I ended up spending 3 1/2 amazing years on this special campus.

And the story of those 3 1/2 years is the story of what the people in this special place have brought me. My story is mainly the story of my team – the story of a bunch of girls leaning on each other and creating a culture of excellence, support and togetherness that went far beyond the soccer field.

My story is also the story of UCLA Athletics and how it has shown me my worth as a student, an athlete and, most importantly, as a woman. Finally, my story is about the UCLA community and how being surrounded by people who consistently strive for greatness has shaped me into the best version of myself.

To my teammates, thank you for being my home away from home, for loving me through the rough patches and always having my back.

From you I learned that you have to fight for what you believe in. I learned that to be truly happy, you have to be yourself. I learned to care for other people. And I learned not to judge, because everyone is going through something.

You also taught me that my worth as a person goes far beyond my identity as an athlete. I learned that worth is not measured by how many minutes are played or how many goals are scored.

Your worth is measured by the people you surround yourself with – what you are willing to do for them and what they are willing to do for you. And just looking around the locker room every day, it is clear that we are all worth a lot.

Finally, I learned that it is OK to not be OK. I learned that mental health is one of the most important and undervalued things in our lives, and I learned that it is okay to reach out for help. So thank you. Thank you for asking me how I was. For caring about how I felt. For pulling me out of the darkness.

From my team, I learned that the bonds created on this campus will last forever and that the stories we share will be with us regardless of where we go.

To my coaches, thank you for giving me a chance to come to this amazing school where I could grow, develop and learn from a group of smart and brave women. Thank you for fostering an environment in which we could thrive, not just as student-athletes, but as women.

Thank you for letting us take a knee, for letting us wear rainbow laces, for letting us volunteer in the community and march for women’s rights. Thank you for developing leaders who are not afraid to speak up and fight for equality.

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Hernandez will graduate in June with a degree in applied mathematics. The Spaniard's academic record has earned her back-to-back spots as a second-team Pac-12 All-Academic honoree. (Alice Naland/Daily Bruin)

To UCLA Athletics, thank you for allowing me to fulfill my dream and for giving me all the tools to succeed on and off the field. Thank you for allowing that 12-year-old Spaniard, who was told that futbol was only for men, the chance to prove otherwise.

From UCLA Athletics I learned my worth as a female athlete. I learned that 12-year-old kid deserved more than having to deal with misogynist comments; deserved more than having to take three buses to go to practice; deserved more than sacrificing her time and her body for no money or recognition.

From UCLA Athletics I learned what equality as a female athlete looks like, and I learned that we have to fight for it outside of college sports – because equality is far from being a reality.

To the UCLA community, everything that my teammates, coaches and UCLA Athletics have taught me has been reinforced and fostered by you. Because at UCLA, the greatest lessons I have learned are definitely not related to my applied mathematics major.

The courage, ambition, perseverance and the continuous fight for equality across the board shown by students and faculty have been a motivation and an inspiration.

At UCLA I learned to learn, I learned to listen and I learned to speak up, supported by the best public university in the U.S. and by the best student body in the world.

I am extremely grateful for all these lessons and bonds that have shaped me into who I am today. I am extremely lucky that I ended up 6,000 miles away from home surrounded by greatness.

And I am extremely thankful that I can forever call UCLA my home. Once a Bruin, always a Bruin.

Hernandez played for UCLA women’s soccer from 2016-2018.

Senior signoffs: Cole Madey remembers his trials and triumphs as a golfer at UCLA

When asked to write a piece on my time at UCLA, I was both honored and humbled.

To simply say my time at UCLA has been amazing would be an insurmountable understatement. In all of my dreams and expectations of the school, I have come to realize UCLA has surpassed them all.

I showed up my freshman year with expectations of being the best student and athlete at the school. I would soon realize that all of my peers also came to this school because they were the best at what they did.

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Cole Madey earned Pac-12 All-Freshman honors in his first season with UCLA men's golf. He was named to the second team all-conference in each of his last two seasons with the team. (Elise Tsai/Daily Bruin)

I would say that, more than anything, my past four years have been a learning process that I am forever indebted to the university and athletic department for. I was immediately thrown into a world of constant expectations from myself and others, trying to balance school with golf. Not until my junior year did I really feel that I got the hang of the whole time management thing.

I remember Tuesdays and Thursdays as days that would truly test my character.

From 6 a.m. team breakfast until 6 p.m. team weights, my day was completely packed with practice, class and maybe a 30-minute break if I was lucky. I came to the realization, however, that this busy schedule was not an onerous duty, but rather a privilege.

I was able to walk around the most beautiful campus in the world – challenged by the most demanding academics in the world – and was constantly pushed to my limits by our athletics program.

When I was running between classes, I would always be proud to have my UCLA collard shirt tucked into my slacks. I may have looked out of place, or like I was dressing like an old man, but I was proud to be wearing those four letters because I was living exactly what they stand for: living every day knowing I gave the effort that I could, to paraphrase Mr. John Wooden himself.

If I were to go back, of course I would say I’d like to change some grades or finish a little higher in a tournament or two. But I don’t think I would have learned as much here if it wasn’t for those tribulations. There is no place in the world that can give a student-athlete a better experience. If I were to give any advice to those starting that path, it would be to just embrace every single aspect of your four years, no matter how difficult it may seem.

When I look back on my time in Westwood, it will be only in the most positive light. The friends I have made – not only in athletics but at the university as a whole – will stay with me forever. I cannot wait to see what the future holds because I know I will be able to tackle it thanks to my preparation and experiences at the best university in the entire world, UCLA.

Madey played for UCLA men’s golf from 2015-2019.

Senior signoffs: Through good times and bad, Alaina Miller thanks UCLA for opportunities to grow

Through the many highs and lows of attending a top university over the last four years, UCLA fostered an environment in which I was able to grow and mature.

I first stepped on UCLA’s campus as a student-athlete in January 2016 after having just graduated early from high school in December. I was recruited to the women’s tennis team at the start of the team’s spring season and – being a naive 17-year-old – believed I was ready to conquer the world.

Attending college as a student-athlete seemed like the obvious next step in my quest, but, in the beginning, let’s just say reality kicked in and I got a big slice of humble pie.

I wouldn’t say my first year of school was easy – it was actually one of the hardest years I’ve been through. Although I know saying that as a 20-year-old probably doesn’t seem too powerful, the pressures of being both an athlete and a student were something I had never experienced at such a high level.

Being homeschooled, I hadn’t been in a real classroom for six years – let alone been in an environment with such an insurmountable amount of germs. My first week consisted of the flu, midnight fire alarms and showing up 20 minutes late to my first lecture after getting lost on campus.

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Alaina Miller was the only four-year senior on UCLA women's tennis this year. In her time as a Bruin, Miller accumulated 70 singles and 72 doubles wins. (Liz Ketcham/Photo editor)

Looking back at my freshman year, all I can say is thank you. Thank you UCLA for completely challenging every single aspect of my life, on and off the court. I truly believe that, had my first year not been so hard, I would not be the same person I am today.

I learned how to handle the tougher situations and excel when put under pressure. I grew a tremendous amount during a time when I had just barely learned how to drive. I was young and wide-eyed, but if I had to do it all over again, I 100% would. I learned how to appreciate the positives and grow from the negatives.

Being a student-athlete has been one of the toughest things I have had the pleasure of experiencing. The discipline required showed me what it is like to have a full-time job as an athlete and student, and it will no doubt help me in my future endeavors.

I have created another family in my teammates. Watching them grow beside me has truly been an honor, and I cannot thank them enough for being by my side every day, suffering and thriving as one.

It has been a privilege to represent the No. 1 public university through athletics and academics. I have established lifelong friendships and relationships that have made my time here some of the best years yet.

UCLA has allowed me to grow and expand my thinking in a way that will no doubt enrich my future. If I could say one thing to my freshman self, it would be to enjoy the lows because they lead to some of the greatest highs.

Thank you, UCLA. You will forever be in my heart.

Miller played for UCLA women’s tennis from 2016-2019.