In this new day and age of football in America, coaches are being paid more then they ever have. This life style has turned every day coaches into famous millionaires. When the winter time comes and the season is over on the field, many coaches are looking to find new contracts and bonuses. Four days after the national championship, Les Miles, head coach for LSU, got an extension of his contract through 2012 and figures to make roughly $3 million a year. And who says coaches are not in it for the money?
This puts Les Miles in a interesting group of four coaches making over $3 million a year, including Oklahoma’s Bob Stoops, Florida’s Urban Meyer, Alabama’s Nick Saban and Iowa’s Kirk Ferentz. In a recent study done by USA Today, this past year for the first time the average earnings of a major, division one football coach reached the one million dollar mark, not including bonuses and perks.
In This survey taken by USA today, they concluded that 50 coaches make at least seven figures, a dozen of which are over $2 million. It has become a given that in December and January, schools are digging deep into their pocket to dish out incentives and bonuses for winning the conference, or a bowl game or even a national championship. Winning these games has become more then just a pride of winning, but a large cash flow into the coaches pockets.
This survey also touched upon bonuses and average salaries per conference. The big ten leads the pack in bonuses (17) with the Big East, the ACC and the MAC all at ten. Even the smaller conference, the WAC still gave out almost 5 bonuses to different coaches.
The average salary for these coaches are roughly the same in all the major conferences. The SEC, the BIG 12, and the Big Ten are all over $1.5 million , with the SEC leading the pack at $1.9 million. This is a huge boost from recent years, but the demand for an excellent coach has raised. Once again, even WAC coaches now a days are making half a million dollars with the even smaller conferences of the Sun Belt and the MAC coaches making a quarter of a million dollars.
USA today got this information from 107 major college coaches, figuring their guarantee pay is around $1.046 million. Just last season it was just under a million dollars. In 1995 there was only five coaches that hit one million dollars in salary, now there is over 50.
Now as a coach, how would you feel about taking in a million some odd dollars, when you are sitting watching game plan one Sunday afternoon after being beaten badly on the field? What about after a win versus a big school rival. Coach Brian Kelly from the Univeristy of Cincinatti states, “It ranges from some days when I’m embarrassed about the amount of money I make to other days that you say, ‘Listen, what’s my market value? These are my earning years, and I’ve got to make sure I get the dollars I deserve. “ So even though these coaches may be getting paid a large sum of money, they have that high value due to the market demand for a great coach. Back fifteen, twenty years ago schools did not want to burn their pockets for their sports because the demand for a win was not as high.
“There was a time when we were content to be 4-4 in the SEC and win three other games and go to a bowl,” LSU athletics director Skip Bertman says. “But evidently, we’re not content to do that anymore. And we have to pay. I think people here understand that.”
Personally speaking, I feel as though these coaches do deserve the cash that they are recieving. A major-college coach is more then what happens on Saturdays and you must be a smart business man as well as have the proper football smarts to run a successful program. Also, the demand is so high for a productive coach that schools will do anything to bring one in, which brings the demand for that coach much higher, raising his cost. If you have a coach like Les Miles who has turned your program around from a sub par team to a constant threat for a national championship, then you want to keep him around to help bring your athletic program those millions of dollars from championship games. And if you want to keep him there, you must pay hm the appropriate figure or he will find it else where.
The college game has turned into a business in the coaching office now, it’s more then just the satisfaction you get from winning. If coaches begin to win and bring you championships, a new contract with a high income better be following or you will lose your championship caliber coach in a heart beat.
Source:http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/football/2007-12-04-coaches-pay_N.htm