J.P. Williams (right) was an assistant commissioner of the Division I Colonial Athletic Association before taking over as the man in charge of the D-III baseball championship.  caasports.com photo

Around the Nation is back for Year 2. Don’t even worry; there won’t be a 10,000-word, four-column nerdfest about new bats and statistics this year. But that’s only because they didn’t change the standard again. If they do, heads up.

Expect a similar tone and format this season. Erudition and humor will be attempted from time to time, without guarantees of either. Each column will once again have a main attraction accompanied by my top five games of the week and my weekly top 25 ballot. Yes, my ballot gets counted in the D3baseball.com poll. From the rarely used Toot My Own Horn department: six of my preseason top nine teams made it to Appleton last year. Later columns will also feature a minor league spotlight.

The bottom line is that something is wrong if we can’t have a mix of seriousness and fun when dealing with baseball, one of the world’s greatest inventions. The feedback option is there if something is wrong or somehow right.

Let’s get on with Year 2, which, like last year, begins with a two-part Q&A with the person in charge of the D-III baseball championship.

Around the Nation spoke with J.P. Williams, the new NCAA assistant director of championships and alliances, who is in charge of the Division III baseball championship. Williams takes over for Anthony Holman, who is now an NCAA associate director of championships at the Division I level. Williams, a former professional football player and Division I athlete, fielded questions related to his athletic and professional background before getting into details of the 2013 Pre-Championship Manual, which outlines the facts, protocol, processes and criteria of the NCAA Division III baseball tournament format and selections.

Also on the call was Cameron Schuh, associate director of public and media relations at the NCAA. Around the Nation complied with a request to submit interview questions prior to the Jan. 30 conversation.

Cameron Schuh: A quick background in terms of your questions about the Pre-Championship Manual and posting it on your site. That actually has gone from being a public-type document to more of a membership-specific tool to a host institution thing. So that’s not something that, in full, we make public. If you ask specific questions to some of the details in there, we can obviously provide them to you. But the entire Manual, as itself, we don’t make public anymore.

Ricky Nelson: OK. Could I ask specifically, now, why that is?

CS: We’ve found over time that the majority of the information that was in it was good on an overall standpoint. We felt comfortable with it. There were some more specific details that were financials and other kind of criteria that were specific to the schools that the membership felt they didn’t want the public to just be reading into why a site could or couldn’t be selected based on its criteria. We just felt that for the comfortableness level of the overall membership, we felt it was better just to make it just private between us – [the NCAA and] those who are bidding to host. And like I said, if you have specific questions to stuff in the Manual, we are able to pull some things out and provide them. But as a whole, we don’t make it available.

RN: Ok. As to that explanation, is there any reason why you can’t release a redacted form of that, because that is an element of transparency that I think a lot of people would have a problem with.

CS: Oh no, you’re right. You’re right about the transparency aspect. It’s just a matter of manpower and time to actually redact the stuff. And that’s just really not something we’re equipped with at this time. I’ll definitely do some more asking around to see about the comfort level of what, specifically, is information we’re not comfortable having out there and be able to share the rest with you. I mean at this time it’s just kind of what our policy is.

RN: OK. There are several sections – I don’t know if you’ll agree with me – but I think several sections that need to be public as far as bid allocations and things like that. And I think if they’re limited to a simple Q&A, a question and answer sort of thing on a website, I don’t think that’s enough access for people. I think they need a document. I think they need something to say, “Ok. This is A, B, C and D of how and why championship teams are selected.”

CS: Understood.

RN: [To J.P. Williams] What can you tell us about your academic and athletic background?

J.P. Williams: Hello, Ricky. I appreciate you taking the time in asking me to join you. I’ve been on the job probably 10 weeks at this point – 12 weeks at this point – so some of the things I may answer may be vague as I’m still learning the process of the NCAA. Before I was here, I was an intern in 2006 with “initial eligibility” in 2006 and 2007. So, I’m familiar with the buildings. I’m just now learning the championships model. I spent the last few years at the CAA [Division I Colonial Athletic Association as assistant commissioner] in Richmond, Va. So, I’ve been in athletics for about 12 years and enjoying that.

Born and raised in Billings, Mont. Student-athlete at the University of Wyoming – football student-athlete and track and field student-athlete there. I had a great time. I wanted to definitely get back to some of the things that I learned there. I had a great student-athlete experience, so I knew before I even graduated that I wanted to work in college athletics.

From there I played two years of Arena Football, here with the Indianapolis Firebirds and then also with the Pensacola Barracudas in Arena1 and Arena2 and then a small stint with the Billings Thunderbolts in the IFL [Indoor Football League] in the early 2000s. I kind of did that thing and then jumped immediately to Little League Baseball. And that was just a regional center here in Indianapolis and was there about five years. Again, I just wanted to work in college athletics, so I kind of left there, did the internship here at the NCAA and then here I am.

I also did my master’s program at Indiana State and that was in the early 2000s also. I got a master’s degree in Sports Administration. So, that just a little bit about me. Pretty boring. You know, nothing special, but just a little something there for you.

RN: Can you speak specifically to your stretch with Little League Baseball and your interest and involvement in baseball?

JPW: Yeah, definitely. I mean from the time I was a youth I’ve loved athletics. I could carry the ball better and run faster than I could hit a curve ball. So, I kind of took that and ran with it – literally. But I always wanted to do things as they related to football, basketball and baseball. It was the Big 3 in the United States and I wanted to get my feet wet in those sports. It was a great opportunity coming out of Arena Football and I had to take it. I loved it. I enjoyed my time there and I felt I knew a lot about the sport as it related to legislation, rules and things like that. And it kind of matched where I wanted to go in my future, so that’s something that I chose.

RN: In your job title as assistant director of championships and alliances, what does the alliances part mean?

JPW: I’m still figuring that out. That’s one of those questions where, I’ve done a lot of the championships piece and then every day I learn something new. I haven’t really touched base with the alliances piece of the championships and, overall, I would assume that it’s an easier way to group us as a whole. Maybe I do some of the alliances stuff, maybe I don’t. But I think that’s an internal answer that may be above my pay grade.

[Schuh followed up with this statement via email: “The ‘alliances’ part of J.P.'s title (Assistant Director of Championships and Alliances) is in relation to overall title of the department. Our Championships group includes both those individuals who directly facilitate the championships, as well as those who oversee the corporate sponsors and broadcast partners. So ‘alliances’ relates to those in the department who don't have specific sport championship oversight but do work in some form or another across all of the championships. Everyone in the department has Championships and Alliances in their title.”]

RN: For which other NCAA sports are you the assistant director of championships?

JPW: I have four sports: Division III football, Division III swimming and diving, Division III wrestling and Division III baseball. And I’m enjoying all of those. I had all of those sports, minus the football, at the CAA. So, I’ve had experience in working with these sports at the college level and, in this case, the Division I level. And then obviously being a football student-athlete, I understand the game of football. I saw the job description and it was something where I was like, “Wow, do they want me? I can’t not apply for this job.” And I love it.

RN: You had touched on a little bit of your D-III experience so far, but how has your adjustment been to D-III after you spent so much time in Division I?

JPW: There’s no adjustment. I mean I spent most of my time in an FCS [Football Championship Subdivision rather than a Bowl Championship Series conference] league, where a lot of the issues that Division III student-athletes and administrators face, they’re facing at that level also. It’s night and day between a BSC conference or school, [but] there’s no adjustment at all. At the end of the day, student-athletes want to compete and the coaches want to coach. So, from this level, I haven’t seen any differences. I mean the size of the student-athlete maybe, but that’s about it [laughs].

RN: What are your goals as the person most responsible for overseeing the D-III baseball championship?

JPW: My goal is to give the student-athlete the best experience that I can. And something that I, coming out of the University of Wyoming, wanted to do, whether you’re a diver, that I have nothing in common with really, or a football student-athlete, or a lacrosse student-athlete. I preach that to my committees as I go on. It’s something that I want to do is give them the best student-athlete experience. I had teammates on my football team that didn’t get the same positive experience. I’m thinking, “Well, we’re on the same team at the same time. How did you not get that same experience?” And it may be something as simple as we go to a game and maybe they didn’t play, or maybe something that happened at that championship was not for them or they didn’t believe in or they didn’t like. Ultimately, that is my goal – to get the best experience for those young people.

RN: What kind of feedback have you gotten about the D-III baseball championship and what do you think you could do better?

JPW: Well, we’re in the preliminary stages of that right now. Some of the things that I think we can improve on: obviously the weather. I obviously don’t control that. But everything as it relates to the bracket. Maybe we could have a bracket that works better for this day and age. And then again, provide the student-athletes the best experience as it relates to banquets, as it relates to student-athlete gifts and things like that. But like I said, I’m working on wrestling and swimming and diving now. I haven’t had a ton of time to jump with both feet into the baseball championship, but it’s something I think about every day.

I talk to Anthony Holman, who I think you interviewed last year, daily about all of the championships. He gives me ideas of what he wanted to do better and I kind of take those and make notes and see what I can do to make those better.

RN: And getting into the Championship Manual, hopefully I get all of these if it’s not going to be available to us. Last season the bid allocation for the NCAA tournament was 38 Pool A, two Pool B and 16 Pool C. A release announcing Rose-Hulman as regional host stated the 2013 allocation is 38, four and 14. You don’t have to get into the specific math of access ratios, but please explain the broad reasons for the allocation change.

JPW: The allocation change is basically based on conferences versus who comes up independent. It’s really math. You kind of take the number of teams in a conference divided by the number of conferences to get a number there. And you take the number of independents divided by the number of individuals not in a conference and then you get a number. And that number is the number of Pool B allocations that you have. You always take those out of Pool C. Actually, you take them out of the at-large bids, but it’s as simple as that. We want a ratio that is – you want to give the same student-athletes who are in the independents, nonconferences, the same as student-athletes who are in conferences.

RN: OK. Asked another way maybe then, which two conferences lose their Pool … actually, no wait. Because if they’re both 38.

JPW: They should come out of Pool C, which are your at-large bids.

RN: Could you get specific and say why it goes from two and 16 to four and 14?

JPW: Well, schools choose to be independent for whatever reason. Maybe it’s financial. Maybe it’s they’re tired of riding the bus for X-amount of hours in a conference. Or they say, “Hey, maybe it makes more sense to be independent.” It’s something the school chooses to do. It has little to do, if anything to do, with the national office.

RN: Ok. Then that is something specific that I think we need to know – who the Pool C and Pool B teams are. And that is something that is usually in the Championship Manual, but we can get to that later.

Besides the bid allocations, are there any major changes to last year’s Championship Manual?

JPW: Not at this point. We’re kind of looking at – there’s been a new bracket that’s kind of been proposed that, I believe, gets taken through the legislative process at the next championships committee meeting. And that’s mid-February. And maybe some of the differences are, as I’m learning right now, I think we have, on Day 1, we have four games as opposed to six and then go from there. But that’s, again, coming down the pike. We don’t know if it’s going to be approved or denied at this point.

RN: And if it would be approved, that would be for this year’s championships?

JPW: Again, it could be. It was proposed as starting in 2013. Obviously, through the legislative process they could take that back to start in 2014 or later. But again, it is proposed in 2013.

[Around the Nation followed up with Schuh on the proposed change to the championship bracket. Schuh stated in an email: “Thanks for seeking clarification on the answer … What he meant to say was that the proposal was to spread out the championship, essentially adding one day, and not have as many games on successive days. So four on the first day, as it is now, then possibly two on the next day, two on the following day, etc., or a variation on that.

Again, this is all in the proposal phase at this point and won't be vetted out or decided on for a few weeks. Also, it might or might not take effect with this coming championship, it is up to the committee to make that determination.”]

RN: The same criteria are going to be the same? Strength of schedule is going to be the same formula and weighting – two-thirds and one-third?

JPW: And again, I’m not sure what the selection criteria were for 2012, so I can’t really speak to that. Again, I’m still learning a little bit about what the selection criteria are. We just had our football criteria meeting. I kind of got versed on that and I kind of want to compare that – my baseball championship to my football – and kind of see if those are the same, if at all or if they’re different. So again, still learning on that and wouldn’t necessarily be comfortable speaking, at depth, on that topic yet.

RN: OK. Well, I think the answers to those questions could be made really simple by getting some form of the Championship Manual.

OK. Could you talk about the process at all? The fourth regional advisory committee [RAC] rankings, traditionally those were not available to the public. I don’t know if we had any influence, but we had asked and they ended up publishing those [baseball rankings] on the NCAA website. And I was wondering if the fourth editions of the previously unpublished rankings are going to be published again this season.

JPW: I’m not sure. My chair, [Commonwealth Coast Conference commissioner] Gregg Kaye, and I have had discussions regarding this. Obviously two different sports, but there were more items published in football this year than there were in previous years. It’s not to say that I want to assume that, “Yes,” but we’re making strides to try to be more transparent and move forward and try to work with media and institutions.

Next week: The conclusion of a Q&A with the J.P. Williams and Cameron Schuh.