Wasserman: Mel Tucker’s absurd guaranteed contract and why it could turn out to be smart

Editor’s note 9/27: Michigan State fired Mel Tucker for cause, saying he brought ‘public disrespect’ upon university

You could make the case this all started with Mel Tucker. This absurd trend of 10-year, fully guaranteed contracts for college football coaches became normalized in East Lansing about a year ago.

Tucker was in the midst of leading the Spartans to an 11-2 record in his second season, which included his second win over rival Michigan, and his name started to appear as a possible candidate for the LSU job. Michigan State, convinced it had its man and fearing that it could lose him, handed Tucker the keys to the kingdom. Almost $100 million, no buyout and a decade to work with. It didn’t matter that Tucker was still relatively unproven as a head coach. He had an exciting vision, experienced success in the transfer portal and exceeded expectations in only his second season. Pay the man his funny money and hope.

After Tucker secured his deal, similar contracts started floating around. Brian Kelly landed a $100 million deal over 10 years to leave Notre Dame for LSU. Mario Cristobal got 10 years and $80 million to leave Oregon for Miami. James Franklin signed a 10-year, $75 million contract extension with Penn State. And you have to assume that USC — a private school — parked a Brink’s truck on Lincoln Riley’s front lawn to pry him away from Oklahoma.

“I don’t quite understand it,” a Power 5 athletic director told The Athletic. “The guaranteed part confuses me. We’re in a results-oriented business. Things ebb and flow. I just don’t quite get that many years guaranteed. A few years, that may make sense in a certain environment. But 10 years? I know it’s more agents than anything, but I really struggle with it.”

Everyone is struggling with it. If the early returns with some of these coaches are any indication of what’s to come, these contracts are, frankly put, really dumb.

But maybe — and this is a big maybe — they’ll turn out to be very smart in the long run. There’s a strong case these schools have stumbled into something I’m calling “forced patience.” We’ll get into that in a bit.

First, let’s be prisoners of the moment. And in this moment, Michigan State is in a dark place. The Spartans finished the 2022 season with a 5-7 record, and six of their losses were by double digits. Two of those wins were against MAC teams. But that’s not even the ugliest part. After its lopsided loss to Michigan, multiple Michigan State players were caught on video beating up Michigan defensive backs Ja’Den McBurrows and Gemon Green in the tunnel leading to the locker rooms. On Nov. 23, roughly one month after the altercation, the Washtenaw County prosecutor announced charges against seven Michigan State players. Six players have been charged with a misdemeanor and one has been charged with one count of felonious assault. All seven players have been suspended from the team indefinitely.

Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren issued a $100,000 fine against Michigan State for the incident and reprimanded the program.

“The Big Ten Conference has a standard of excellence both academically and athletically that has been built over 127 years,” Warren said in a statement. “Our standards require that our student-athletes, coaches and staff members represent the conference, and their member institutions, with the highest level of decorum and sportsmanship. We are taking disciplinary action and will continue to work with our member institutions to strengthen their gameday procedures and ensure our honored traditions.”

What an awful look for not only Michigan State but the man leading the program.

When you’re making out the check, that’s spelled M-E-L-T-U-C-K-E-R.

Yikes.

We can all admit these contracts — for now — seem foolish and irresponsible. It’s not just about Michigan State.

Look at what’s happening with Jimbo Fisher, who has an $88 million buyout and is basically holding the Texas A&M football program hostage with his offensive stubbornness. Or Miami, which lost home games to Middle Tennessee, Duke, Florida State and Pitt by an average of 26.5 points en route to a 5-7 record. How about Penn State? It is relatively solid team but one that was embarrassed on the road against Michigan and lost to Ohio State by double digits despite having the expectation of being those programs’ equals.

“If you’re hiring a coach into a new environment or extending him in the short term, until that person in that environment demonstrates a certain level of success, it confuses me why you’d come out of the chute with a 10-year guarantee,” the Power 5 athletic director said. “I know everyone is trying to demonstrate stability and commitment or they don’t want to lose someone, but it seems to me that someone should have to prove themselves for a while before getting a contract like that.”

But this is Michigan State’s fate, the one it sealed for itself the second the ballpoint pen hit the check. There’s not much to be gained by yelling into the abyss about why things are hopeless.

Let’s focus on the concept of “forced patience.”

We always feel as though we have to react to events with a countering action. When the stock market goes down, many of us have the compulsion to buy or sell assets when the prudent thing is to do nothing most of the time. That happens in college football, too, a place where coaches are fired after two or three years with regularity. They get canned in the middle of a season or canned after a season. They get canned in the middle of a build when things start to veer off course. Coaches get fired all the time, and when they do, it always seems like the right move.

The unfortunate truth about firing a coach is that we’ll never get to see the alternate results. What if a program didn’t fire a coach when things went off track? How would it have turned out in five years had the program stayed the course? That’s all speculation.

If Dabo Swinney were hired in the current climate, would he have been fired after losing seven games in Year 3 (his second full season)? There’s a strong possibility he wouldn’t have been given time to build in this results-oriented business where patience is sorely lacking. But Clemson stuck with Swinney, and the Tigers have won at least 10 games every year since 2011. Oh, and they have won two national titles, and Swinney is one of two coaches who has transformed a program from good to elite (Georgia’s Kirby Smart is the other). Every athletic director is looking for the next Swinney.

There hasn’t been a next Swinney because everyone gets fired too quickly. Or, if they are too good too fast, they bolt to a new program.

There is no staying power one way or another.

Anyone who has lost track of what Michigan State is trying to do because of the five losses this season has either taken their eyes off the ball or never understood the build to begin with. What Tucker is doing — trying to elevate Michigan State’s stature in the recruiting realm — isn’t an overnight process. This is a five-year plan, if it works at all. Whether it’ll work is up in the air, but you don’t sign a coach for $95 million guaranteed if you don’t think it’s going to work.

The patience? Buyer’s remorse? All of that is gone because the administrators and boosters who, at their core, want to react aren’t able to.

Reacting is all everyone has done. The average tenure at Power 5 schools for coaches hired in the 2000s is 5.2 years (this includes Iowa’s Kirk Ferentz, the only active head coach hired in the 1990s). In total, there have been only 25 total coaching tenures at the Power 5 level in the century that have lasted for 10 years or longer. That’s a lot of hiring and firing.

In Michigan State’s case? Nope. Forced patience.

The incident from the Michigan game has added another wrinkle. It’s a terrible situation and Tucker must handle it prudently. This is delicate because it pertains to the program’s culture and how Michigan State is viewed by the rest of the country, which could trickle into recruiting. It’s the coach’s job to be an ambassador of the brand, a leader of men and to act accordingly when off-the-field issues like this arise. But this isn’t something that should define Tucker’s tenure, and as time goes on, this story will fade into the past like everything else.

Look back to Mark Dantonio’s tenure. In 2009, 11 Spartans football players plead guilty to assault charges for their involvement in a brawl in an on-campus dorm. Five of the 11 returned to the team that won the Big Ten title the next season.

There are a lot of parallels between that incident and what Tucker is dealing with now. How will he react?

Tucker’s long-term vision has been paying dividends in recruiting. The Spartans haven’t arrived, but four-star prospects are committing to the program in greater numbers. What will that look like in five years if Tucker reaches his goal and the Spartans are a legitimate threat in national recruiting circles?

Yes, 10-year contracts are dumb. It’s easy to be outraged by them. The early returns are terrible.

But in 10 years, when given the benefit of time to work through the rough patches and see his plan through? Maybe this will be the best thing that Michigan State ever did. Or Miami. Or Penn State. Or any other program that is all but certain to write a check with eight zeroes.

It also could prove to be financially responsible. Tucker is making a boatload of money now, but what will his contract look like in five years when the rest of the country catches up? If Tucker turns Michigan State around, he might actually be a bargain in Year 5 of his contract. On HBO’s “Real Sports,” billionaire Michigan State donor and former Spartans basketball player Mat Ishbia said he contributed $14 million toward Tucker’s contract. “Ten years, $95 million sounds like a lot right now,” he said. “In eight years, that’ll be middle of the road.”

Forced patience. Say it again.

“It forces you to be patient,” the athletic director said. “But at the beginning, there should be a conversation that leads you to believe that it is going to take X number of years to turn it around. That’s what the buyout number is tied to. It’s business thinking. But now, this causes you to not overreact and you may reflect on the business plan you put in place or elements that come into play that change the business plan, like NIL for example.”

In Michigan State’s case, Tuck Comin’, alright. Because there’s no way he’s going anywhere else.

Forced patience. Michigan State has to show it, so you may as well, too.

Keep your eyes on the prize and never lose sight of the long-term vision. That’s what Michigan State is paying all that money for.

(Photo: Aaron J. Thornton / Getty Images)