AJC Article - Georgia Tech football assistant salaries largely the same from 2019

[GTHomer]

An article definitely worth reading:

Georgia Tech football assistant salaries largely the same from 2019

For the second year of his tenure, Georgia Tech coach Geoff Collins kept the salaries of his 10 assistant coaches largely the same, except for raises for running backs coach Tashard Choice and defensive line coach Larry Knight that moved their pay into the same range as other assistants.

www.ajc.com

This paragraph is the one that caught my interest:

"Comparing that total with FBS assistant coach salary figures for 2019 compiled by USA Today, the 2020 salary pool would rank seventh in the ACC among the seven conference schools that were compelled to share salary information through open-records requests. It also would rank 46th among the 51 power-conference schools that released contracts."

Are we getting greater value that what we are paying for?

 

[tsrich]

I think it's a little early to tell. Recruiting has been better, but our on the field results are still not far off of where our salaries rank. I'm hoping that answer will be different in the next couple seasons

 

[Techster]

Choice and Marco Coleman are worth every penny.

It's interesting our DC and OC make squat compared to most coordinators.

 

[stech81]

It's interesting our DC and OC make squat compared to most coordinators.

Hence why we always have a problem

 

[LongforDodd]

Hence why we always have a problem

Ted Roof was paid fairly well, wasn't he, towards the end of his stint here?

 

[Jacketman99]

This is part of the reason we do not attract a certain level of coaches some people would like. The salaries that we offer are just not competitive enough. Even if we pay a head coach a reasonable salary, we do not have enough in the pool to get the high level assistants. Who was coming to GT with the transition we needed to make and a below average salary? It will be hard for us to get successful established coaches or young, hot coaches unless there is a GT connection. This is another reason we should all pray that CGC succeeds at GT.

 

[gtrower]

Ted Roof was paid fairly well, wasn't he, towards the end of his stint here?

Believe CPJ was towards the top of the ACC when he got his raise (helps that we didn’t have to salary an OC). Assume our donors will find the money to pay the staff if/when they start winning. No reason to overpay for the experience level / win total we have right now.

 

[RonJohn]

Ted Roof was paid fairly well, wasn't he, towards the end of his stint here?

If I recall correctly, there were some donors who donated to supplement his salary and bring him here. Also, there wasn't an official OC position, so that means nobody was paid to be an OC at that time.

 

[smokey_wasp]

Choice and Marco Coleman are worth every penny.

It's interesting our DC and OC make squat compared to most coordinators.

Agreed, and I would add Kerry Dixon to that list. Flies under the radar but I love what he has done with our WR group, including the guys he inherited. He is also probably our best recruiter and I didn't necessarily see that coming.

We are spending, at most, half of what we will need to at the coordinator spots. We will have to pony up, whether it be because those guys end up deserving a raise or we decide to move on.

 

[4shotB]

Believe CPJ was towards the top of the ACC when he got his raise (helps that we didn’t have to salary an OC). Assume our donors will find the money to pay the staff if/when they start winning. No reason to overpay for the experience level / win total we have right now.

Isn't this a chicken and the egg question? We look at these guys and their pay on an absolute rather than a relative scale. It doesn't matter that Coach X is making $450,000 ( a nice piece of change most of us would agree) if the average pay for that position is $800,000. We expect things from the GTAA that we would never expect of ourselves or our companies (private or public). It is the very definition of insanity. Can I get lucky hiring an experienced mechanical engineer for $65,000. Probably but I am not expecting him or her to stay with me very long. If you have ever hired, the "hope and pray" or "catch lightning in a bottle" methods aren't fruitful in the long run.

 

[smokey_wasp]

Ted Roof was paid fairly well, wasn't he, towards the end of his stint here?

Around 800k? if I recall correctly.

 

[RonJohn]

Isn't this a chicken and the egg question? We look at these guys and their pay on an absolute rather than a relative scale. It doesn't matter that Coach X is making $450,000 ( a nice piece of change most of us would agree) if the average pay for that position is $800,000. We expect things from the GTAA that we would never expect of ourselves or our companies (private or public). It is the very definition of insanity. Can I get lucky hiring an experienced mechanical engineer for $65,000. Probably but I am not expecting him or her to stay with me very long. If you have ever hired, the "hope and pray" or "catch lightning in a bottle" methods aren't fruitful in the long run.

I would not label it as a chicken and egg situation. If you want to make good returns on investments, then you have to save money to investment accounts. Expecting to get very successful football with no investment, that will then support itself because of the success is like expecting your investment account to start showing good returns before you actually put money into it. GT has had periods of success while operating on a shoestring budget, but nothing sustainable and nothing that generated enough support to make it sustainable.

 

[Oldgoldandwhite]

So one million per win? Pretty good bargain, don’t you think?

 

[Deleted member 2897]

I would not label it as a chicken and egg situation. If you want to make good returns on investments, then you have to save money to investment accounts. Expecting to get very successful football with no investment, that will then support itself because of the success is like expecting your investment account to start showing good returns before you actually put money into it. GT has had periods of success while operating on a shoestring budget, but nothing sustainable and nothing that generated enough support to make it sustainable.

That's not too different than what 4shot was saying.

 

[gtrower]

Isn't this a chicken and the egg question? We look at these guys and their pay on an absolute rather than a relative scale. It doesn't matter that Coach X is making $450,000 ( a nice piece of change most of us would agree) if the average pay for that position is $800,000. We expect things from the GTAA that we would never expect of ourselves or our companies (private or public). It is the very definition of insanity. Can I get lucky hiring an experienced mechanical engineer for $65,000. Probably but I am not expecting him or her to stay with me very long. If you have ever hired, the "hope and pray" or "catch lightning in a bottle" methods aren't fruitful in the long run.

I wouldn’t call it chicken or the egg for our current situation. We hired an unproven coach. Throwing $4/5M at him wouldn’t make him a better coach. We’re paying for what we got (in fact probably a little more than he really deserved at the time).

And at the same time if for some reason Urban decided he wanted to coach at his daughters alma mater I’m sure donors would come up with the funds to pay him what he wanted.

 

[RonJohn]

I wouldn’t call it chicken or the egg for our current situation. We hired an unproven coach. Throwing $4/5M at him wouldn’t make him a better coach. We’re paying for what we got (in fact probably a little more than he really deserved at the time).

And at the same time if for some reason Urban decided he wanted to coach at his daughters alma mater I’m sure donors would come up with the funds to pay him what he wanted.

Would donors pay enough to give Urban an $7-9 million salary? Maybe. Would they also donate enough to sustain an assistant coaching salary pool of $7-8 million (similar to Ohio State)? Probably not. Would they also donate enough to hire as large of a football staff as Florida or Ohio State have? Probably not.

It isn't just the head coaches salary. It isn't just the assistant coaches salary pool. It isn't just the salary pool available for additional football staff. It isn't just facilities that are behind the curve. GT's football budget is tens of millions of dollars behind where top programs' football budgets are. The mutts spend about twice as much at GT on football. I don't know the latest numbers, but a few years ago the only P5 schools that spent less money on football than GT were: Purdue, Wake, Oregon State, and Kansas.

 

[gtrower]

Would donors pay enough to give Urban an $7-9 million salary? Maybe. Would they also donate enough to sustain an assistant coaching salary pool of $7-8 million (similar to Ohio State)? Probably not. Would they also donate enough to hire as large of a football staff as Florida or Ohio State have? Probably not.

It isn't just the head coaches salary. It isn't just the assistant coaches salary pool. It isn't just the salary pool available for additional football staff. It isn't just facilities that are behind the curve. GT's football budget is tens of millions of dollars behind where top programs' football budgets are. The mutts spend about twice as much at GT on football. I don't know the latest numbers, but a few years ago the only P5 schools that spent less money on football than GT were: Purdue, Wake, Oregon State, and Kansas.

If Urban wanted to come here, we sure as hell would be finding that money.

 

[jacketup]

I wouldn’t call it chicken or the egg for our current situation. We hired an unproven coach. Throwing $4/5M at him wouldn’t make him a better coach. We’re paying for what we got (in fact probably a little more than he really deserved at the time).

And at the same time if for some reason Urban decided he wanted to coach at his daughters alma mater I’m sure donors would come up with the funds to pay him what he wanted.

I still find it strange that people view Collins as "unproven" given that he was a DC at two SEC schools and was a HC at an FBS school. Gailey had no FBS coaching experience--even as an assistant. Johnson had no P5 experience and he only had one stop at any FBS school--Navy--which is not in a conference and is a different place to recruit for. Having coached with O'Leary, Saban and Mullen, Collins' resume is the best we've had since O'Leary.

We do need money for assistants. In 2019, Clemson had two offensive assistants who made $1 million and the DC made $2 million.

Texas fans believe Meyer is headed there, but we will see.

 

[yeti92]

I still find it strange that people view Collins as "unproven" given that he was a DC at two SEC schools and was a HC at an FBS school. Gailey had no FBS coaching experience--even as an assistant. Johnson had no P5 experience and he only had one stop at any FBS school--Navy--which is not in a conference and is a different place to recruit for. Having coached with O'Leary, Saban and Mullen, Collins' resume is the best we've had since O'Leary.

Well a lot of people are saying that these first two years can't be held against Collins since he didn't recruit the players, so if we apply the rule evenly, he gets credit for 2 years as DC at Mississippi State and that's it. His first 2 years at MSU he was co-coordinator and didn't recruit those players, and his 2 years at Florida he didn't recruit those players. He may have learned from Saban but he didn't coach anything at Bama. Sounds pretty unproven to me...

 

[gville_jacket]

I still find it strange that people view Collins as "unproven" given that he was a DC at two SEC schools and was a HC at an FBS school. Gailey had no FBS coaching experience--even as an assistant. Johnson had no P5 experience and he only had one stop at any FBS school--Navy--which is not in a conference and is a different place to recruit for. Having coached with O'Leary, Saban and Mullen, Collins' resume is the best we've had since O'Leary.

We do need money for assistants. In 2019, Clemson had two offensive assistants who made $1 million and the DC made $2 million.

Texas fans believe Meyer is headed there, but we will see.

I think Meyer could go to the real USC. But we'll see and he could very well never coach again.