Ubben: Everyone (but coaches) hates fully guaranteed contracts, why more are coming

Sep 25, 2021; Arlington, Texas, USA; Texas A&M Aggies head coach Jimbo Fisher watches his team before the game between the Arkansas Razorbacks and the Texas A&M Aggies at AT&T Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports
By David Ubben
Dec 12, 2022

Jimbo Fisher, Mel Tucker and Brent Venables coached this season with $233.5 million combined in guaranteed money in their pocket. Fisher and Tucker are coaching with 10-year, $95 million deals, and Oklahoma welcomed Venables back to Norman with $43.5 million.

Every cent of each of their deals is guaranteed. And after the 2022 season, every cent is also under question. Fisher, Tucker and Venables’ teams combined to lose 20 games in 2022. Only Venables, at 6-6, has his team in a bowl.

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Good for the three coaches for generating generational wealth for their families, but the takeaway from the outside seems simple: Maybe long-term deals with guaranteed money aren’t a great idea.

Fortunes, narratives and the desires of a coach’s constituency can change in a hurry. Just ask Ryan Day.

That’s the sober, level-headed takeaway. But there’s a problem: Rarely are coaching searches undergone and extensions drawn up with sober, level heads. And what Fisher, Tucker and Venables’ did in 2022, spawning groans across their campuses, won’t mean fewer such contracts in the future.

Instead? It just means more.

“Those guaranteed contracts reset the market,” one Power 5 athletic director said. (The Athletic granted anonymity to three athletic directors in exchange for candid responses about the hiring process.)

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All three coaches are at programs currently inhabiting or preparing to inhabit the sport’s two richest conferences. Those “nonprofits” have to find somewhere to spend the money, and as the television revenue in college sports has skyrocketed to levels once thought impossible, no one has benefited more than coaches.

But more importantly, any coach with a sky-high approval rating or any coach with no reason to leave his current post as another program woos him can point to those deals. Their case is simple: “If those guys got long-term, fully guaranteed deals, I should get one, too.”

Obviously, down years like Tucker, a rough start like Venables or failing to meet sky-high expectations like Fisher are things that will have to be addressed.

Said one athletic director: “When something like this happens a few times in college sports, it’s only going to be more and more accepted and the outlier eventually becomes the norm.”

Nebraska’s Matt Rhule, hired this month after going 11-27 with the Carolina Panthers of the NFL, has 90 percent of his eight-year, $74 million deal guaranteed.

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Athletic directors’ jobs often are defined by their ability to get their man. Missing a candidate or worse, missing a candidate willing to take your job because negotiations fell through can cost an athletic director his or her own job.

“You can say you won’t make a deal like that, but in the new market, not making a deal like that is the difference between getting a coach and not getting him,” a Power 5 athletic director said.

No athletic director ever has been fired for overpaying for a successful coach who becomes the most popular man on campus. And thus, another chapter of the most lopsided rivalry in college sports — agents versus athletic directors — is written.

Coaching contracts with higher and higher percentages of guaranteed money have arisen, in part, because of a growing lack of patience from fans and boosters, and as a result, athletic directors are quick to pull the rug out from under once-promising candidates.

Coaches might sign a deal for seven years, but from their perspective, if a small portion of that deal is guaranteed, it’s anything but a seven-year deal.

In this year’s coaching carousel, one school made it clear to candidates in early negotiations that only 40 percent of the contract would be guaranteed, a person briefed on the matter told The Athletic. The result? Nearly every prospective candidate pulled his name out of contention for the open job.

And these days, the question least asked as ill-advised extensions and wildly one-sided contracts are signed more often than ever is simple: What if it doesn’t work? Guaranteed contracts are the only thing tackling that inconvenient question in the honeymoon period of a new marriage between coach and school.

Fisher’s guaranteed deal? It’s working. If it cost $10 million to fire the Aggies coach, they would be far more likely to hit the reset button than if it cost $86 million. He was hired to turn A&M into the national power it always has dreamed of becoming. He has recruited like one, but he’s just 39-21 in five seasons, has finished in the top 15 once and has lost at least four games in four of five seasons. Instead of joining the ranks of the unemployed after a nightmare season, Fisher is getting the opportunity to reboot his offense and examine his program.

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Michigan State is hoping Tucker’s disappointing season is a blip on the radar and not the start of a trend, although the financials could pay off long-term as the tide of coaching salaries continues to rise.

Successful coaches pondering a big move never have had more leverage to tie schools to deals like those Texas A&M currently regrets and Michigan State and Oklahoma may regret if the trend lines for their coaches don’t change. The pressure for schools in the future to agree to similar deals is immense, and an athletic director can’t afford to let a successful coach walk for money reasons or miss on a candidate by drawing the line at similar contracts and refusing to budge.

Drawing that line and hiring a coach who doesn’t measure up to the success that other big-time candidates surely would have had (imaginary success, it’s worth reminding) is a gamble that could cost an athletic director his or her job. Do the big contract? Write the big check? An athletic director can more easily point to the market rate or the pressure from boosters and pass the blame if it doesn’t work.

History suggests most programs and most hires never will satisfy the demands of fans and boosters every year. But, of course, the next dream candidate will, and the cost of giving him a chance to prove it is rising.

(Photo of Jimbo Fisher: Jerome Miron / USA Today)

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David Ubben

David Ubben is a senior writer for The Athletic covering college football. Prior to joining The Athletic, he covered college sports for ESPN, Fox Sports Southwest, The Oklahoman, Sports on Earth and Dave Campbell’s Texas Football, as well as contributing to a number of other publications. Follow David on Twitter @davidubben