Brian Kelly contract: $100+ million, 10 years
“LSU’s offer to Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly is a 10-year deal that will take him north of $100 million with incentives,” via The Athletic’s Matt Fortuna.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:22 PM ^
Freaking crazy. But don’t blame the man. If they are stupid enough to pay him he can be smart enough to take it.
November 29th, 2021 at 11:23 PM ^
Gonna give any of that haul back to the paycheck to paycheck working folks in the LSU Athletic department?
Didn't think so.
November 30th, 2021 at 1:09 AM ^
I thought the LSU athletic department was broke and had to cut programs?
November 30th, 2021 at 6:11 AM ^
Gonna go out on a limb and guess Kelly will give more than you in life to help others.
November 30th, 2021 at 6:54 AM ^
I’ve never killed a dude by putting them in egregiously unsafe conditions.
So I’m up 1-0 on that. I also plan to carefully protect that lead.
November 29th, 2021 at 11:24 PM ^
Kelly is an idiot to go to the meat grinder division of the SEC where the chances of being successful are nil. He had a great set up at ND where he can recruit, and win plenty of games each year for a chance at the championship. If he were a little better coach he would have won one as well. Now he’s looking at a lot of 500 seasons. Riley is the smartest one here.
November 29th, 2021 at 11:50 PM ^
Nick Saban isn't going to be around forever, and when Texas and OU join, there's no guarantee that they'll be any better than LSU. LSU has had three straight coaches win National Championships, and two of them had Midwest, not SEC roots. I think the chances of Kelly being successful at LSU are decent to good.
November 30th, 2021 at 12:06 AM ^
And if he fails he'll get something like $30 million to leave...
November 29th, 2021 at 10:23 PM ^
Lots of these types of contracts being thrown around lately. I would have figured JH's would become more popular with schools and alumni becoming more results oriented...
November 29th, 2021 at 10:54 PM ^
You can do that when your coach is in the fold already. But to poach another team's guy, you've got to overpay.
November 30th, 2021 at 12:20 AM ^
I think it also helps that Harbaugh came from Michigan. He has history at his school and coaching here means more to him than it would to others. I wouldn't be surprised if he took pride in his incentive laden contract. There is a sense of pride one can find in earning a reward instead of a guaranteed outcome no matter the result.
November 30th, 2021 at 5:29 AM ^
JH is pretty unique (both as an individual and in this situation). You’re not going to get a coach making a boatload of money at another school to come to your school with a JH contract. 99% of coaches would also laugh right in your face if you offered them a 50% pay cut like Jim took.
November 30th, 2021 at 7:38 AM ^
Back in the late 70’s or early 80’s, can’t remember exact year, Texas A&M offered Bo $1M to leave Ann Arbor, the richest HC contract offer of its day. Bo said thanks, but no. Some things are about more than money.
I hope our coach(es) Harbaugh & Howard will always be compensated fairly so the next better offer isn’t an allure, but maintain this same attitude about coaching here, that it’s special and it’s not really about the pay ultimately, it’s about the love and ongoing tradition of excellence.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:23 PM ^
Meanwhile, our coach is giving money away.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:51 PM ^
Not for long. You know Harbaugh wasn’t happy about taking a pay cut, but I don’t think he wanted to leave without proving the doubters wrong, which he now has. He’s going to get paid by someone. I wouldn’t automatically discount the NFL rumors which will no doubt be starting up again soon unless Michigan acts first.
November 29th, 2021 at 11:02 PM ^
I think he is referring to the fact that Harbaugh just announced that he is donating his incentive payments back to the athletic department towards people who took pay cuts because of COVID. So yes, Harbaugh continues to literally give money away
November 29th, 2021 at 11:09 PM ^
Actually, Jim brought up the restructuring of his contract. He wanted to reduce the pressure on Warde and thought the Dept would need the money because of COVID. He is going to get paid but he was not mad about the cut.
November 30th, 2021 at 12:04 AM ^
I hadn't heard that but it doesn't surprise me. He loves Michigan and isn't primarily money-oriented. Everything I have heard about him indicates he is a good person.
November 30th, 2021 at 12:30 PM ^
The man drives an f150 and buys, or at least used to buy his pants at Walmart. I doubt he even knows how much money he has and probably doesn’t give two shits. He could walk right now and never have to worry. Harbaughs going nowhere and happier than a pig in shit in A2.
November 30th, 2021 at 5:17 AM ^
If you think that the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd item motivating JH is money….then you just don’t know him at all.
November 30th, 2021 at 8:49 AM ^
"Second verse-same as the first."
November 30th, 2021 at 9:25 AM ^
This a thousand times over. And this is why my strong preference is that he remains strongly connected to Michigan football.
My best guess is that something happened privately several years ago that distracted Jim from being a high level college football coach-for a period of time. Jim is a few weeks away from being 58 years of age. He has been there-done that in the football world. I do wonder if he would be amenable, even prefer, to be given a corner office in the AD and made the CEO of Michigan football...not having to be in charge of the day-to-day operations yet over-seeing the program directly-and mentoring the next HC...there are several outstanding prospects among the current set of assistants. I believe Jim has great vision and perspective for a position such as this and would take Michigan football to heights it has never been in the modern era.
November 30th, 2021 at 8:12 AM ^
The Oracle 2,
that is the trollingest comment I’ve seen on here all week and it was an Ohio St. game week. That is impressive.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:24 PM ^
I’m not saying it won’t work out but he’s going to have a way harder time getting 10 wins seasons when he’s not playing NC State and Navy and broke ass Florida State
November 29th, 2021 at 10:33 PM ^
LSU opens with Florida State next season…
November 29th, 2021 at 10:47 PM ^
Oh that’s funny!
November 29th, 2021 at 10:25 PM ^
Everyone can thank Mel Tucker and MSU for the Wild Wild West we are now in
November 29th, 2021 at 10:28 PM ^
Just remember, schools don't have $ to pay players.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:55 PM ^
Field hockey players are salivating at the opportunity.
November 30th, 2021 at 12:33 AM ^
Seems like some schools have a lot of extra money around to pay coaches all of a sudden, now that players are getting paid legally through NIL deals, and not under the table.
November 29th, 2021 at 11:02 PM ^
MSU is in a class of their own for what they did with that contract:
- Riley is 55-10 with 4x conference champs and 3x CFP appearances
- Kelly is 113-39 with 2x CFP appearances, and built strong teams at GVSU, CMU, and Cincy too.
- Tucker is 17-14 and his primary achievement is one season of winning close games in which his teams were outplayed and a borderline top 25 team that managed to win all 4 close games they were in when they really were something more like a lucky 8-4 team by fancy stats. This would basically be equivalent to M giving $100 million to Hoke after the 2011 Sugar Bowl 11-2 season. Real nice year...but a bit of a mirage. Tucker may well turn out to be a good coach, but Sparty is paying him like he is a proven great coach.
November 29th, 2021 at 11:37 PM ^
It's not really MSU, though. A young guy worth nearly $8B (who was a walk-on for Izzo) decided that he wanted to spend some of his wealth to keep Tucker at MSU. It only takes a handful of very rich individuals to change the market for coaches.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:27 PM ^
Saban just heard the news.
November 30th, 2021 at 1:05 AM ^
No wonder he's been so mellow as of late. You can't see it very well, but on the podium is the new sign for the school formally known as Alabama, which has been renamed, 'Saban University'.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:28 PM ^
He’s 60 years old.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:28 PM ^
Guess I would go there also if I was Him
November 29th, 2021 at 10:28 PM ^
I don’t think this will work out for LSU. Kelly is a decent coach. Not great.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:53 PM ^
You can call Brian Kelly all kinds of things but just a decent coach isn’t one of them.
November 30th, 2021 at 1:08 AM ^
He's had one heck of a run the last five years, but look at the three years prior to 2017:
2021 11 1
2020 10 2
2019 11 2
2018 12 1
2017 10 3
2016 4 8
2015 10 3
2014 8 5
November 30th, 2021 at 10:32 AM ^
But isn't his run the last 5 years pretty much smoke and mirrors? The majority of the schools he played had not so great seasons.
In 2020, his best wins were the triple overtime win over Clemson but that was only because Trevor Lawrence couldn't play. His other best wins were against North Carolina (8-4), Boston College (6-5) and Pitt (6-5.)
In 2019, his best wins were a 2 point with over USC (8-5), Virginia (9-5), Iowa State (7-6).
In 2018, his best wins were against...sigh...Michigan (10-3), Stanford (9-4), Northwestern (9-5) and Wake Forest (7-6).
In 2017, his best wins were against Sparty (10-3), USC (10-3) and Wake Forest (8-5).
1-6 against legit top ten teams (the one win being against Trevor Lawrence-less Clemson) a couple O.K. wins and a TON of crappy teams. He's a good coach, I won't argue that. But I think he's getting a little too much credit.
It's got to be the Notre Dame factor. Nobody bats an eye if you beat a mediocre team. But if you're Notre Dame and you beat a mediocre team, you've done something special.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:28 PM ^
Kelly gonna live it up like Coach O
November 29th, 2021 at 10:35 PM ^
Someone with the skills to do so needs to put Kelly’s face over the woman’s.
November 29th, 2021 at 11:47 PM ^
Being Brian Kelly
November 30th, 2021 at 8:59 AM ^
You're being humorous, but it is interesting to consider that if LSU wanted to move away from the image of their head coach being a lecherous lout, Brian Kelly may not have been the best choice.
November 30th, 2021 at 12:29 PM ^
Orgeron: "All I did was ask her to work out together ... at least I didn't kill anyone, like some coaches I know"
November 29th, 2021 at 10:30 PM ^
Good luck with that.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:34 PM ^
This is not going to end well.
November 29th, 2021 at 10:35 PM ^
If he doesn't work out after a few years, that's one hell of a big contract for LSU to still be paying.