Papa John’s mogul John Schnatter resigns from University of Louisville athletics board

Papa John’s John Schnatter speaks his mind at U of L board of trustees meeting. Mary Ann Gerth/C-J

Papa John’s Pizza mogul John Schnatter, who recently criticized the University of Louisville athletics department during a U of L Board of Trustees meeting, has resigned from the school’s athletics association board, according to a U of L athletics spokesman.

Schnatter was not at Thursday’s athletics board meeting.

Schnatter, who remains a member of the overall university board of trustees, has been replaced on the athletics board by retired Hilliard and Lyons executive James Rogers, who is also a university trustee.

U of L interim President Greg Postel said Schnatter recently informed board of trustees Chairman David Grissom he was resigning from the athletics association board, which is composed of members appointed by the university trustees. Schnatter didn’t give a reason for his resignation, Postel said.

At a recent board of trustees meeting, Schnatter called U of L athletics director Tom Jurich “invisible,” apparently referring to his lack of attendance at trustee meetings, and said the athletics department needed to be “fixed.”

Jurich told reporters after Thursday’s athletics board meeting that he didn’t know Schnatter had resigned from the athletics board. He laughed at a question asking if Schnatter had been removed or pushed out, saying that was not true.

Jurich, who Thursday gave a spirited defense of the transparency and behavior of the athletics department, said he has never in his long tenure at the school been asked to regularly attend U of L board of trustees meetings and was told by former U of L President John Shumaker that his job was to report to the athletics board.