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The richest men in college football, as in the rest of the economy, are getting richer.
In 1982, the legendary Bear Bryant made $450,000 coaching football at Alabama, or $1.4 million in today\u2019s dollars. Alabama\u2019s current coach pulls down $11.4 million, over 10 times what Bryant pocketed.
Five college football coaches this year are\u00a0collecting<\/a>\u00a0more than $10 million in compensation. Five more collect at least $9 million.
Looking at figures like that, it\u2019s only natural to feel out of sorts when grad assistants who teach college classes are\u00a0averaging<\/a>\u00a0just $18,661 a year. Meanwhile, student debt is ballooning and the administration\u2019s efforts to provide relief have faltered.
Here\u2019s why the rest of us \u2014 especially college football fans \u2014 should care about fixing this.
Let\u2019s start with the fan perspective: This is a golden age for college football. On any given Saturday, fans can catch dozens of games on TV. But today\u2019s televised games have become interminable slogs, with long and frequent commercial breaks that can disrupt the ebb and flow of the action on the field. While viewers at home can switch the channel when a three-minute commercial break begins, fans in the stands can only sit on their hands and watch players mill around on the sidelines.
To make matters worse, far too many college football games have essentially become \u201cglorified scrimmages<\/a>\u201d that pit big-time football powers against vastly overmatched out-of-conference opponents. These games happen because the TV networks need ever more content they can sell to advertisers to justify the mega-deals they\u2019ve signed with college football\u2019s biggest conferences.
That same network pressure has steadily lengthened the college football season. In 1947, Notre Dame\u00a0won<\/a>\u00a0the national championship after going undefeated in just nine games. Since 2006, college football powers have been playing regular seasons that run 12 games long,\u00a0plus<\/em>\u00a0playoffs and bowl games.
Last year, the national champion Georgia Bulldogs ended up playing 15 games.
These longer seasons \u2014 combined with the bigger, faster bodies of college football players who work out year-round in top-tier training facilities \u2014 mean more opportunities for horrible injuries. According to a 2016 academic study of one four-year period, 50.7 percent of players on teams in college football\u2019s top division sustained at least one injury.\u00a0\u00a0
How many players make it past this injury obstacle course and make a living playing pro football? The NFL notes that just 1.6 percent of the young men in college football\u2019s top division \u201cever make it to the professional level.\u201d
And those who do don\u2019t stay long. The average pro career\u00a0lasts<\/a>\u00a0just over three years.
Meanwhile, college football\u2019s top coaches have much more lucrative staying power. One stalwart in those ranks, Jimbo Fisher, signed a 10-year deal with Texas A&M two years ago that fully guaranteed him $9 million per year. The university\u00a0fired<\/a>\u00a0Fisher this year after his A&M teams only won 64 percent of their games. A&M now owes Fisher the remaining $76 million on his contract.\u00a0
Payoffs this huge encourage up-and-coming coaches to cut corners \u2014 to play players who ought to be recuperating or to look the other way when rich alumni slide bribes to potential recruits.
We need to take on this excessive compensation to start fashioning a healthier college football future. College coaches\u00a0rate<\/a>\u00a0as the highest-paid public officials in 43 states.
To rein in this excess, we could take the lead in the growing movement\u00a0to curb<\/a>\u00a0excessive CEO pay at corporations. One reform proposal now before Congress would\u00a0levy<\/a>\u00a0a new excise tax on corporations with CEOs who make more than 50 times their typical worker pay. Another proposal would help\u00a0deny<\/a>\u00a0government contracts to firms with wide pay gaps between top executives and workers.
We could adapt either of these approaches to college sports. Does your university want to keep getting federal aid? Then, don\u2019t make your coaches super-rich at the expense of your staff and students.
We can do something about inequality in this country. And it would make for better football, too.
Sam Pizzigati
Pizzigati co-edits\u00a0<\/span>inequality.org<\/a>\u00a0<\/span>at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, where he is an associate fellow. He wrote this for\u00a0<\/span>InsideSources.com<\/a>.
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