Coach Contracts: Nick Saban

This is the first in a series on coach contracts. You can find them thanks to the USA Today. Today’s subject is Nick Saban’s contract with Alabama.

Image CC by Flickr user jimmyjosh.

Either the University of Alabama is particularly paranoid (entirely possible), doesn’t really trust Nick L. Saban (also possible), or both (most likely candidate). Saban was required to initial every page of his contract, including the final page where he signed it, something only Les Miles at LSU was also required to do. In addition, there are constant references throughout that he should not do things to embarrass the university, which is probably a result of the Mike Price fiasco.

In fact, after the standard introductory legalese the contract begins with expectations regarding his behavior and a statement requiring him to be “a loyal employee of the University.” Every other contract goes immediately into financial terms, but not Alabama’s. It starts right off requiring him to be a good citizen and a loyal employee.

And that’s another thing. In these contracts, the person being hired is generally referred to as “Coach” throughout rather than using the guy’s name. This is probably so it’s easier to recycle the contract with minimal editing after they kick the lout to the curb for not winning championships every year. There are three exceptions to this in the conference: Mark Richt is “Richt,” Phil Fulmer is “Coach Fulmer,” and Nick Saban is “Employee.” I suppose it’s because Alabama has a bylaw somewhere restricting the use of the word “Coach” to the Bear and only the Bear.

The only capital “C” Coach the University of Alabama has ever had. Image CC by Flickr user jimmywayne22.

Saban gets a number of perks, though it’s interesting where the university draws the line. It will pay for him to have a country club membership, but not any food he buys while there. It must give him two cars to use, but it is not required to give him athletic shoes or clothing. He gets up to 25 hours flight time on a private jet (something no other coach I’ve seen gets), but those hours don’t roll over from year to year.

Overall it’s 32 pages long, tied for longest in the conference (not counting addenda to other coaches’ contracts) with Urban Meyer’s deal at Florida. The majority of it seems standard in comparison to other contracts, though the sections on what allows the university to terminate the contract and the ensuing damages are longer than in most other agreements.

Selected Quotes:

“Employee accepts the employment and agrees to act at all times in a manner consistent with good sportsmanship and with the high moral, ethical, and academic standards of the University. Employee shall exercise due care that all personnel and students under Employee’s supervision or subject to Employee’s control or authority shall comport themselves in like manner.”

It must not be difficult to meet these requirements at the University of Alabama, with its rich tradition of bending and breaking NCAA rules. I wonder if all of the player arrests this off season mean he’s in breach of his contract?

“Employee agrees to be a loyal employee of the University.”

Again, this is the first thing the contract says after going through the legal definitions. Got trust issues, do we?

“If Employee is awarded the Paul ‘Bear’ Bryant Coach of the Year Award by the National Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association… $50,000.”

This is from the details of his bonus for winning coach of the year from any one of 4 organizations. Meyer and Steve Spurrier also have various national coach of the year award-related bonuses, but only Saban gets dough specifically for winning the Bear Bryant award. Huge shocker there.

The Hat before Les Miles was the Hat. It will forever loom large over the Alabama program, and perhaps its commemoration will earn its current coach a cool $50,000. Image CC by Flickr user diamondduste.

Coach Contracts

I just discovered a wealth of fascinating information: the USA Today has every publicly available Div. I-A coaching contract compiled for easy reference. Perhaps I’m woefully late to this wagon train, but as I just about never read anything by the USA Today I think I can be excused for that. Now, these things are generally unreadable legalese, but there’s some great stuff in these and I’m going to go through some and pull out the interesting tidbits so you don’t have to. Hey, sometimes you gotta reach for content in the offseason.

I’m going to begin with the SEC, and if there’s any demand beyond that I’ll do more. Bobby Johnson’s contract with Vanderbilt is unavailable since Vandy is a private school. For some reason the Mississippi schools didn’t release their coaches’ contracts either despite them being public institutions; it’s strange because Southern Miss did release Jeff Bower’s old deal, so it’s not some quirk in Mississippi state law that prevents those contracts from being public. Also, nothing has been updated after this winter’s coaching carousel, so for example Arkansas still just has Nutt’s old deal rather than Petrino’s contract.

I’m going to do them in alphabetical order, so when the first one goes up this evening it’s going to involve two controversy magnets: Alabama and Nick Saban.