As the modern day philosopher Fat Joe says, "Yesterday's price is not today's price." I'm not sure if Mr. Joe authored that phrase with college football coaching in mind, but either way it applies, as underperforming coaches are fired and new ones are bought in on higher salaries than their predecessors, who themselves commanded higher salaries than the guys they were brought in to replace. See North Carolina, where Bill Belichick will earn twice what Mack Brown was paid.
So, yesterday's price is not today's price, unless it is.
New West Virginia head coach Rich Rodriguez signed a 5-year contract that averages $3.75 million annually and starts at $3.5 million, ESPN's Pete Thamel reported Friday.
That sounds like a lot of money -- and, indeed it is -- until it's placed in context. Rodriguez will coach the Mountaineers at a discount compared to the $4 million that WVU paid Neal Brown in 2024.
It's still a massive raise from the $1 million and change Rodriguez made at Jacksonville State this season. He was the highest-paid Conference USA head coach by $56,000 according to the USA Today salary database, but the $3.5 million figure will make him the second-lowest paid Big 12 head coach, per the site. Arizona's Brent Brennan made $3.1 million this year.
Factoring in inflation, Rodriguez will earn less in 2024 than the contract that got him to leave West Virginia in the first place. Rodriguez made $2.5 million at Michigan in 2008, which equates to $3.675 million today. Likewise, Rodriguez's $2.875 million salary at Arizona in 2017 would be worth $3.71 million today.
This is all semantics, of course. Rodriguez and West Virginia are the right coach and the right program at the right time, and clearly yesterday's price was right for both of them.
As always, stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.