Holding no cards, OU prez Harroz should choose seriousness over empty threats

University of Oklahoma President Joseph Harroz speaks during a news conference on Nov. 29, 2021, in Norman. Harroz wants the city of Norman to build a new arena the Sooners will call home. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki)

I’m trying to decide.

I’m trying to decide when University of Oklahoma president Joe Harroz took his grievances to the student paper, threatening to take his arena business elsewhere, did he realize how patently absurd he sounded or did he know full well how patently absurd he sounded, but made the play anyway?

Here’s how the student paper put it:

In his Evans Hall office, Harroz [said] if Norman City Council does not approve the proposed $1 billion entertainment district that would feature a new arena for OU athletics, then the university, alongside donors, would look to other cities to build an arena for which its basketball and women’s gymnastics teams would be anchor tenants and possibly the entertainment district as a whole.

It then quoted Harroz:

“If this isn’t approved by the [Norman] city council for whatever reason, then we’re going to be looking at … Oklahoma City, Moore, surrounding areas and figure out where there is a group that wants to do this.”

Got it?

A little history.

Back in September, Harroz, along with the Norman Economic Development Council, Norman mayor Larry Heikkila, Cleveland County commissioner Rod Cleveland and VisitNorman president Dan Shemm, came together and announced plans for the $1 billion project.

Not long after that, University Northpark LLC, through its attorney, Sean Rieger, according to the reporting of StateImpact Oklahoma, announced that, yes indeed, plans were in place to do what all the VIPs said they wanted to do back in September.

“You can simply walk all the way through that entertainment experience and enjoy your day before the game, enjoy your night after the game,” Rieger was quoted as saying.

For a moment, let’s be charitable toward Harroz, because there’s a good chance he’s not cross with the city nearly so much as he’s cross with University Northpark LLC, which, given its name, was created for the sole purpose of developing the project.

He may feel that way because, as the student paper reported, University North Park LLC had asked the Norman Planning Commission to not bring up the project at its December, January and February meetings and, at its most recent meeting, postponed the subject until later this week.

Got that?

Now, on to Harroz, because he can’t possibly be serious.

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Already the students aren’t coming to Lloyd Noble Center — perhaps because they’re stuck with end zone seating and always have been, rather than alongside the court like, say, Duke and Michigan State — yet now they’re going to get themselves to an arena four miles from campus to watch hoops and gymnastics, let alone somewhere in Moore or Oklahoma City (or Goldsby, Washington, Newcastle or Blanchard)?

Good luck.

Further, the apparent disingenuousness is off the charts.

For instance, back in September, Harroz said this, as reported by The Norman Transcript’s Olivia McCourry and Brian King:

“You’ve got to create a live, work, play environment where people are attracted and want to be, and create a community that is so desperately missing from our lives today.”

I mean, come on.

Even if that were true, maybe leave it for the mayor to say, because how can a university president awash in his own campus community, possibly know the thing Norman really lacks is "community” beyond campus and the place to create it is north of Robinson on the city’s outskirts?

For that matter, would Harroz care one bit about a $1 billion entertainment district, complete with a new arena, if Sooner men’s basketball could fill up the gym it’s already got, a gym with a history of getting filled or something close to it, provided it’s men’s basketball team doesn’t constantly disappoint.

Note to Harroz, please tell Porter Moser he’s not allowed to lobby for a new arena until the team he puts on the court finishes in the top half of the conference in which it exists.

For that matter, perhaps Harroz should not be threatening to do arena business elsewhere when renovations of about 13,400 square feet “of team spaces, locker room spaces and other areas necessary to support the men’s and women’s basketball programs,” according to The Sooner Club’s website, were being carried out the length of the most recent basketball season.

Most of all, Harroz should not be threatening Norman when Norman holds all the cards.

He’s the one with an old, poorly-constructed-in-the-first-place, lousy-home-court-advantage basketball arena.  

He’s the one who would not be telling Norman what it “desperately” lacks if his basketball arena were filled the way it was filled for Billy Tubbs, Kelvin Sampson, Sherri Coale and, many times, Lon Kruger, precisely because they were putting great and fun-to-watch teams on the court.

Maybe a $1 billion project that includes an arena housing Sooner sports 28 percent of the time would be pretty cool.

Yet, I’m pretty sure Harroz thinks he needs that arena more than Norman needs everything promised to come with it, and should he actually find partners elsewhere, the city will be just fine, while Sooner athletics hit the road just to play at home, which is ridiculous.

Try being serious instead.