Tim Brosnan, a former MLB executive who brokered more than $20 billion in media deals, will take over as BIG EAST commissioner on Sept. 1, the conference announced Monday, Aug. 10. He steps in 18 days before Villanova football opens its inaugural Patriot League season.

Brosnan succeeds Val Ackerman, who announced her retirement in April. He is the sixth commissioner in the conference's 47-year history.

The hire is about revenue. Rev. Brian J. Shanley, O.P., president of St. John's University and chair of the conference's board of directors, said the search committee "prioritized finding someone with extensive experience in the area of revenue generation." Shanley called Brosnan "a relationship-builder" whose "track record of forging highly successful partnerships will be critical in this new era of college athletics."

That era is already underway for the BIG EAST, which is in the first year of a six-year media agreement with FOX Sports, NBC Sports and TNT Sports. The deal runs through 2030-31 and is worth roughly $80 million annually, according to industry reports.

Brosnan spent 24 years at Major League Baseball, rising to executive vice president for business and president and CEO of MLB Enterprises. He ran media negotiations that produced landmark agreements with triple-digit percentage increases in rights fees. He also developed and launched the MLB Network in 2009, which debuted to 50 million households, and conceived the World Baseball Classic.

A Georgetown alumnus, Brosnan was a four-year letter winner as a pitcher for the Hoyas and captained the team as a senior. He graduated in 1980 and earned his law degree from Fordham in 1984. He most recently served as chief executive of Hoyas Rising, Georgetown's NIL arm, from 2021 to 2025.

For Villanova, the leadership change arrives at a packed moment on the calendar. Women's soccer opens Thursday, Aug. 13, at Syracuse, with fifth-year goalkeeper Hannah Dickinson named to the United Soccer Coaches' national goalkeepers-to-watch list. Football makes its Patriot League debut Friday, Aug. 28, hosting William & Mary. And men's basketball tips off Nov. 1 in Rome against Notre Dame, airing on FOX at 9:30 a.m. ET.

Brosnan takes office Sept. 1. Villanova football hosts William & Mary three days earlier on Aug. 28.