re: Billy Napier is Alabamas next coach

quote:

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Kelly was the right hire. A proven coach who can navigate LSU the next 4-5 Years to a better spot.

It's not going to be a popular rebuild among the faithful. Also think it wise to give him the big contract to protect him from the fans.

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While this may in fact prove to be the case, it will be an absolute disaster financially if it isn't.

Here's a quick rundown of Kelly's guaranteed payouts through the first four years of his contract, regardless of results on the field (figuring a $50,000 annual raise built into the deal, plus a $500,000 annual bonus if he's still LSU's HC on July 1 of every year):

2022: $ 9,000.000 (base salary)
2023: 9,550,000 (base + raise + longevity bonus)
2024: 9,600,000 (base + raise + longevity bonus)
2025: 9,650,000 (base + raise + longevity bonus)

This is of course not including an additional $500,000 bonus for a bowl invite in years they are eligible.

So, if LSU goes 5-7 (or worse) in the first 4 years of BK's contract, he will still have received $37,800,000 for his troubles - and this is NOT including the other perks of his deal ($1.2 million 0% interest home loan, car allowances, private plane usage, etc).

And then they would owe him 90% of the remaining 6 years on his deal, amounting to somewhere in the neighborhood of $50,000,000 more.

tl;dr: this "proven coach" will make a MINIMUM of $88,000,000 over the next four seasons even if he fails miserably and never has a regular season over .500. Tack on another $500k for every year he manages to get them to a bowl - ANY bowl, no matter how minor.

And I thought AU's braintrust was foolish (well, they still are, but not to this epic level).