Key takeaways from USA Today's coaching salary database
Key takeaways from USA Today's coaching salary database
The newspaper released its annual coaching salary data, and there are several big takeaways on what these numbers mean. Chief among them: Football is king, even at basketball schools.
USA Today released its annual salary database of public school college football head coaches. The hours of research and number of requests that go into this project are surely exhausting, and they are absolutely appreciated by all of us who have interest in the sport. From one subscription site to another, I can tell you: This list alone is worth the price of a USA Today subscription.
Here are our takeaways from the data:
Which one of these is not like the others?
Not that we needed a reminder in light of recent events, but boy was that Mel Tucker contract bad. USA Today tweeted a graphic of the five highest-paid coaches, and Tucker’s $10 million salary was on there — right behind Nick Saban, Dabo Swinney, Kirby Smart and Ryan Day. That’s three coaches who have won multiple national titles, an Ohio State coach who has had the second-best winning percentage in the sport since he took the job … and Tucker, who was 20-14 at MSU and had a single full-season winning record before getting fired for cause last week.
Mike Gundy’s ranking is eye-opening
The highest-paid coach who is not in the Big Ten or the SEC and has not won a national title? That would be Mike Gundy, whose $7.625 million salary at Oklahoma State is tied with Wisconsin’s Luke Fickell for No. 13.