College Football Head Coach Salaries

[Mavric]

USA Today put this together

Harbaugh #1 at $9M - that's over $2M more than #2 Saban

Riley #42 at $2.8M

Also, this has been part of why the B1G has lagged behind. I would have guessed it would have moved up some but the median is still relatively low.

 

[Mavric]

4. The Big Ten is getting closer to the SEC.
Last year, the SEC had 11 of the 20-highest-paid coaches. This year, it’s 9, and the Big Ten has 5 (Harbaugh, Urban Meyer, Kirk Ferentz, James Franklin and Mark Dantonio).
Now, you won’t see an entire Big Ten division make at least $4 million (like the SEC West), but the top programs are paying top-dollar for their coaches.

 

[swmohusker]

Kansas HC makes 800K. What a joke.

 

[jsneb83]

Haven't there been complaints that the lower tier Big 10 teams have just been cashing in their share of the TV deal and would rather get a coach for cheap instead of paying more for a bigger name?

 

[JJ Husker]

Rather telling that the B1G average includes the highest single salary. My quick and probably inaccurate math adjusts the B1G average to a meager $2,272,500 sans Harbaugh. I realize these are still ridiculous salaries but shouldn't a place like Nebraska, with our relatively high resources, be paying our HC quite a bit more. Not angling to get HCMR a raise but if we want (and WE do) to be in the discussion year in and year out? The Moneyball approach wouldn't seem to fit well in CFB.

 

[zeWilbur]

Rather telling that the B1G average includes the highest single salary. My quick and probably inaccurate math adjusts the B1G average to a meager $2,272,500 sans Harbaugh. I realize these are still ridiculous salaries but shouldn't a place like Nebraska, with our relatively high resources, be paying our HC quite a bit more. Not angling to get HCMR a raise but if we want (and WE do) to be in the discussion year in and year out? The Moneyball approach wouldn't seem to fit well in CFB.

HCMR took a smaller salary so he could have a larger assistant salary pool. The total paid to all football coaches/staff by a school is completely ignored in this situation but something you have to keep in mind.

 

[HuskerMav11]

Rather telling that the B1G average includes the highest single salary. My quick and probably inaccurate math adjusts the B1G average to a meager $2,272,500 sans Harbaugh. I realize these are still ridiculous salaries but shouldn't a place like Nebraska, with our relatively high resources, be paying our HC quite a bit more. Not angling to get HCMR a raise but if we want (and WE do) to be in the discussion year in and year out? The Moneyball approach wouldn't seem to fit well in CFB.

HCMR took a smaller salary so he could have a larger assistant salary pool. The total paid to all football coaches/staff by a school is completely ignored in this situation but something you have to keep in mind.

Do you have any source for this? Now I'm curious about the numbers when comparing Coaching Salaries among schools.

 

[GBRHouston]

Rather telling that the B1G average includes the highest single salary. My quick and probably inaccurate math adjusts the B1G average to a meager $2,272,500 sans Harbaugh. I realize these are still ridiculous salaries but shouldn't a place like Nebraska, with our relatively high resources, be paying our HC quite a bit more. Not angling to get HCMR a raise but if we want (and WE do) to be in the discussion year in and year out? The Moneyball approach wouldn't seem to fit well in CFB.

HCMR took a smaller salary so he could have a larger assistant salary pool. The total paid to all football coaches/staff by a school is completely ignored in this situation but something you have to keep in mind.

Does that include the $450K we give to nobo- I mean... Bruce Read?

 

[marko polo]

We do it on the cheap around here. If and when we have to replace mike and we want to get into the big leagues we will have to pony up, which I don't see us doing.

 

[Mavric]

According to the newly updated USA Today coaches’ salary database, Riley received total pay of $2.8 million during the 2015-16 fiscal year. That places him seventh among his conference peers and No. 42 nationally. A year ago he ranked sixth in the Big Ten and No. 39 overall.

Riley also stands to receive bonuses worth a maximum of $950,000 — though no incentive-based payments were distributed after last season — and his contract will add $100,000 to his salary each year.

OWH

Also interesting:

According to USA Today, Riley would be owed more than $6.6 million should he be fired without cause. That’s ninth in the Big Ten. Four coaches would stand to receive more than $19 million (Meyer, Harbaugh, Ferentz and Smith). Franklin, Dantonio, Ash and Durkin would also be owed a higher buyout than Riley.

According to Riley’s contract, should he be fired by Nebraska without cause, he would be owed $170,000 per month for the remainder of his deal, which runs through February 2020. That amount would be adjusted should Riley gain other employment after his termination.

Comparatively, Bo Pelini was owed $150,000 per month, and that amount was reduced to $128,009 through February 2019 after he was hired by Youngstown State. That means Pelini is still owed roughly $3.5 million by Nebraska. When Bill Callahan was fired in November 2007, it was stated that NU had 60 days to pay him a remaining amount of $3.125 million, which it did in one lump sum on Jan. 22, 2008.

 

[zeWilbur]

Rather telling that the B1G average includes the highest single salary. My quick and probably inaccurate math adjusts the B1G average to a meager $2,272,500 sans Harbaugh. I realize these are still ridiculous salaries but shouldn't a place like Nebraska, with our relatively high resources, be paying our HC quite a bit more. Not angling to get HCMR a raise but if we want (and WE do) to be in the discussion year in and year out? The Moneyball approach wouldn't seem to fit well in CFB.

HCMR took a smaller salary so he could have a larger assistant salary pool. The total paid to all football coaches/staff by a school is completely ignored in this situation but something you have to keep in mind.

Do you have any source for this? Now I'm curious about the numbers when comparing Coaching Salaries among schools.

Just looked through the individual budgets for NU. The football salary pool increased from $3.27 million in 2014 to $4.34 million in 2015 with the head coach making 400k less in 2015. $4.61 million overall in 2016 after adding Billy Devaney(300k).

Still trying to find a direct quote admitting why HCMR took what he did but NU clearly loosened the purse strings and it wasn't for the head coach.

 

[BigRedBuster]

Rather telling that the B1G average includes the highest single salary. My quick and probably inaccurate math adjusts the B1G average to a meager $2,272,500 sans Harbaugh. I realize these are still ridiculous salaries but shouldn't a place like Nebraska, with our relatively high resources, be paying our HC quite a bit more. Not angling to get HCMR a raise but if we want (and WE do) to be in the discussion year in and year out? The Moneyball approach wouldn't seem to fit well in CFB.

To be accurate, this is the "MEDIAN" salary which is different than "average" salary.

I would be interested in seeing the "average" salary rankings.

 

[JJ Husker]

Rather telling that the B1G average includes the highest single salary. My quick and probably inaccurate math adjusts the B1G average to a meager $2,272,500 sans Harbaugh. I realize these are still ridiculous salaries but shouldn't a place like Nebraska, with our relatively high resources, be paying our HC quite a bit more. Not angling to get HCMR a raise but if we want (and WE do) to be in the discussion year in and year out? The Moneyball approach wouldn't seem to fit well in CFB.

To be accurate, this is the "MEDIAN" salary which is different than "average" salary.
I would be interested in seeing the "average" salary rankings.

You are correct sir, my bad. I just looked at the colorful bar graph, didn't read it, and assumed those were averages.

 

[Miandrital]

Here are the mean salaries for those who are curious:

SEC

$4,004,097.86

B1G

$3,477,851.86

Big 12

$3,797,934.11

PAC12

$3,098,024.45

ACC

$2,988,623.82

AAC

$2,829,408.11

Ind

$1,019,083.67

Mt West

$857,684.83

C-USA

$739,448.31

Sun Belt

$528,055.30

MAC

$574,948.92

 

[huKSer]

Rather telling that the B1G average includes the highest single salary. My quick and probably inaccurate math adjusts the B1G average to a meager $2,272,500 sans Harbaugh. I realize these are still ridiculous salaries but shouldn't a place like Nebraska, with our relatively high resources, be paying our HC quite a bit more. Not angling to get HCMR a raise but if we want (and WE do) to be in the discussion year in and year out? The Moneyball approach wouldn't seem to fit well in CFB.

To be accurate, this is the "MEDIAN" salary which is different than "average" salary.

I would be interested in seeing the "average" salary rankings.

Median is a better determinate of "middle" than mean IF there are large outliers. But I will defer to Moraine on this.

Bo's salary started low and increased with his success. Might be the business plan with HCMR

TO would take his pay raise and distribute it among his assistants.

What would be interesting is to see the amount paid to each school's head coach and buy outs of former head coaches. KU might be in the lead on this - I think at one time they were paying for 3 or 4 head coaches at the same time.