Sid Hartman: Gophers' Pitino gets $400K pay increase

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per Sid:

Richard Pitino will be earning $400,000 more per season, as the Gophers have given him a pay increase.

It was reported in March that Pitino had seriously considered taking the Alabama head coaching position, and apparently athletic director Norwood Teague recognized Pitino’s worth to the university and had fears about him leaving, because the university decided Pitino deserved the bonus a season earlier than scheduled.

When Pitino signed in 2013 he was given a six-year deal with an annual salary of $1.2 million with a base salary of $500,000 — which would increase by at least 5 percent per season — and supplemental compensation of $700,000 for media, fund-raising, community involvement, endorsements, and apparel, shoes and equipment arrangements.

Pitino will still rank toward the bottom of the Big Ten in terms of men’s basketball coaching salaries, but the 32-year-old should leap John Groce at Illinois, Tim Miles at Nebraska and Iowa’s Fran McCaffery in yearly salary.

http://www.startribune.com/gophers-pitino-gets-400k-pay-increase/306863981/

Go Gophers!!
 

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Go Gophers!!
 

Welcome to building a big time program in today's environment.
 


Avery Johnson got nearly 3 million per year from Alabama. The Gophers kept Pitino from "taking the Alabama job" by bumping him up to 1.6 million? Hmmm
 


I've always been surprised at how little Minnesota pays their coaches(Football and Mens basketball I don't know the others). We say we want to win but the investment compared to the best teams in the BIG just doesn't add up.
 


Tim1406 said:
I've always been surprised at how little Minnesota pays their coaches(Football and Mens basketball I don't know the others). We say we want to win but the investment compared to the best teams in the BIG just doesn't add up.
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Respectfully, not so sure about that. We just gave Pitino (mostly unproven as a head coach) a $400,000 raise that puts his salary above 3 other Big Ten coaches who have led their programs to the NCAA Tournament within the last 3 seasons (Groce 2013, Miles 2014, McCaffery 2014 & 2015). This coming off a season where the trajectory of the program on the court (the most important place) went the other way. I think the U has treated Pitino quite well with this pay bump. Certainly if I were Fran (or his agent) I would be knocking on my AD's door and requesting a conversation.
 

I'm ok with Richard Pitino being on the low end of the pay scale in the Big 10. He hasn't proven much.

I'm also ok with giving him a 400k increase to keep him here. He's still near the bottom, where he should be.
 



Winasota Gopher said:
I'm ok with Richard Pitino being on the low end of the pay scale in the Big 10. He hasn't proven much.

I'm also ok with giving him a 400k increase to keep him here. He's still near the bottom, where he should be.
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+1
 

SelectionSunday said:
Respectfully, not so sure about that. We just gave Pitino (mostly unproven as a head coach) a $400,000 raise that puts his salary above 3 other Big Ten coaches who have led their programs to the NCAA Tournament within the last 3 seasons (Groce 2013, Miles 2014, McCaffery 2014 & 2015). This coming off a season where the trajectory of the program on the court (the most important place) went the other way. I think the U has treated Pitino quite well with this pay bump. Certainly if I were Fran (or his agent) I would be knocking on my AD's door and requesting a conversation.
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Well I'll put it this way. Jerry kill made $2.1 mil last year which was good for 45th highest in college football out of ~110 total D1 schools(not sure where on the Power 5 that is). Richard Pitino made $1.2 mil last year good for last or at least bottom 2 in the BIG last year. Combined that's $3.3 mil or less than Tom Izzo, Thad Matta, Mark Diantonio, Kirk Ferentz, Urban Meyer, James Franklin make individually. Other coaches who are close to $3.3 million but don't get over it are Tom Crean(3.05) Bo Ryan(2.95 mil), *Bo Pelini($3.05 mil) *Brady Hooke($2.85 mil we all know Harbaugh is now more).

That makes 10 of 28(35.7%) coaches in the Big ten who made nearly as much as or more than our basketball and football coach combined. That's all my point was. I think outside of Rutgers and Illinois we have the lowest combined salary for the 2 sports(northwestern was just slightly more than us with 2.2 for Fitz and ~1.4 for collins).

I guess i just don't understand how we don't have money to pay the coaches more. Except maybe we don't have the football money that other schools do.

*Money is total pay from http://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/salaries/mens-basketball/coach/ or http://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/salaries/ or found from google if not listed
 

^^^ bad numbers; need to understand incentive programs & earnings there under. Any idea that Kill is being underpaid is nonsense
 

per Pat:

The idea that this raise was coming had been in the wind with the local sports media for several weeks – that Teague planned to give a raise to Richard Pitino, the Gophers’ young and so far unsuccessful men’s basketball coach, as soon as the Legislative session came to a conclusion.

If that was the case, that the university wanted this information to come after the political business in St. Paul was concluded, then that timeline can be presumed to have come from Kaler.

Reason: The university is always at the Legislature begging for more, and Kaler’s people would not want to run into even one politician who would say, “You must have more money that you need over there if you’re handing it out to Rich Pitino for no Earthly reason.’’

Pitino was hired to replace the fired Tubby Smith after the 2012-13 season. The Gophers missed the NCAA tournament and won the NIT in 2013-14. They brought back an experienced team with adequate talent in 2014-15 and completely fell on their faces.

Most observers considered them 50-50 for the NCAA before the start of the season. The Gophers were never in contention for the NCAA. They were 6-12 in the Big Ten, a season that became such a disaster that they didn’t even get a place in the NIT.

There are 68 teams in the NCAA and another 32 get named to the NIT, the traditional consolation tournament. That means Richard Pitino’s Gophers did not figure in the nation’s top 100 for the postseason.

http://www.startribune.com/title-ix...of-turn-to-page-c3-of-star-tribune/306948951/

Go Gophers!!
 



I said it in my topic (that was deleted for pc). Anyone who thinks this coach is going to be here in 2 years is living in the same place that Professor Philip Barbey is building his widget factory- Fantasyland!
But hey, this extra $400,000 of what papa Rick calls pocket change could change his mind...LOL.
 

Tim1406 said:
I've always been surprised at how little Minnesota pays their coaches(Football and Mens basketball I don't know the others). We say we want to win but the investment compared to the best teams in the BIG just doesn't add up.
Click to expand...

+1
 

$400k would have made a decent amount of progress towards the practice facility rather than going to an undeserving coach who likely already has a nice trust coming from daddy at some point. I am constantly baffled by the way Richard Pitino is treated; it has to come strictly from his last name because he has done nothing on the court to make me think he is a hot commodity.
 

Personally I think the emphasis on Pitino's record right now from fans is a separate issue than his job performance. While we are understandably upset about a bad season on the court, that's not what determines his contract nor raises.

It sounds like NT and Pitino sort of saw these as "throw away" years since Pitino had Tubby players and that NT wanted to grade Pitino on recruiting initially. Pitino has been pretty successful there now with the time to do so.

To me, this seems more like a reward for solid recruiting and staying than anything to do with on court success.

NT managed to keep Shaka at VCU. I will continue to trust his knowledge running a basketball program for now.
 

A lot of hate going on here. Get over it, he is the coach at a B1G university. You shouldn't low ball the coach if you expect him to take your program to the top of the B1G. The reality is that the price of a coach at the B1G level is high and you should expect to pay it. Just because you couldn't attract a high profile coach doesn't mean that you should low ball the coach you got. If you expect success you need to pay the going rate, if he doesn't work out you replace him. You don't take that as an opportunity to be cheap and then lose the coach to someone who is willing to pay them once they succeed.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

alchemy2u said:
A lot of hate going on here. Get over it, he is the coach at a B1G university. You shouldn't low ball the coach if you expect him to take your program to the top of the B1G. The reality is that the price of a coach at the B1G level is high and you should expect to pay it. Just because you couldn't attract a high profile coach doesn't mean that you should low ball the coach you got. If you expect success you need to pay the going rate, if he doesn't work out you replace him. You don't take that as an opportunity to be cheap and then lose the coach to someone who is willing to pay them once they succeed.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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+1
 

alchemy2u said:
A lot of hate going on here. Get over it, he is the coach at a B1G university. You shouldn't low ball the coach if you expect him to take your program to the top of the B1G. The reality is that the price of a coach at the B1G level is high and you should expect to pay it. Just because you couldn't attract a high profile coach doesn't mean that you should low ball the coach you got. If you expect success you need to pay the going rate, if he doesn't work out you replace him. You don't take that as an opportunity to be cheap and then lose the coach to someone who is willing to pay them once they succeed.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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First the results, then the pay. Not the other way around.
 

dpodoll68 said:
First the results, then the pay. Not the other way around.
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it can be a chicken or egg sort of thing though. I understand where you might not want to give that to Pitino after he is already under contract but if a team like Alabama is willing to pay him $3 mil/yr then we either step up or have to take a seat and understand our place as a result. Based on pay 3rd/4th lowest in the BIG our basketball team did exactly what they should have last year being in 11th. Just something we should accept that anything more than that is over-achieving from a coaching pay point of view.
 


Norwood is a "big picture" guy. Watch the press conference where he announced the firing of Tubby Smith, he didn't fire him for results of that particular season , but rather because he wasn't happy with the "vision and direction of the program." Although last year Pitino didn't get the results we all hoped for, Norwood is obviously pleased with where the program is going and our future. Granted success is not guaranteed, but still better to be proactive about keeping Pitino happy so we are not behind the 8 ball in terms of keeping him around if and when success comes.
 

dpodoll68 said:
First the results, then the pay. Not the other way around.
Click to expand...

That's a great idea... Too bad we don't live in that world. Its supply and demand, whether or not the rumors were true or not is irrelevant. There is an assumed demand for possible up and coming coaches and the price for them is apparently higher than what we were giving Richard.

He can walk at any second with very little recourse. It would hurt us more to lose him than to pay 400k to keep him and hope he pans out.

If you want to play chicken with a talented coach then don't be upset when he walks away and you're sitting with your McNuggets in your hands and nothing to show for it and a reboot only 2 years into the rebuilding.

I know some of your rebuttals already so bringing up that Tubby shouldn't have ever been fired, or that he underachieved last year is not a good point, as it doesn't matter.
 

Winasota Gopher said:
That's a great idea... Too bad we don't live in that world. Its supply and demand, whether or not the rumors were true or not is irrelevant. There is an assumed demand for possible up and coming coaches and the price for them is apparently higher than what we were giving Richard.

He can walk at any second with very little recourse. It would hurt us more to lose him than to pay 400k to keep him and hope he pans out.

If you want to play chicken with a talented coach then don't be upset when he walks away and you're sitting with your McNuggets in your hands and nothing to show for it and a reboot only 2 years into the rebuilding.

I know some of your rebuttals already so bringing up that Tubby shouldn't have ever been fired, or that he underachieved last year is not a good point, as it doesn't matter.
Click to expand...

We absolutely do live in that world. The salary paid for someone's services shouldn't be a penny more than what it costs to retain them. Richard Pitino thinks he can get paid more than $1.2 million elsewhere? I'd call his bluff in a second. We can do better. He has shown zero evidence whatsoever that he's capable of being a successful coach in the Big Ten. I mean, give me a break. He has a lower winning percentage in Big Ten games than Dan Monson.
 

I'm fine with the raise. But releasing the news on the same day as the investigation piece hits the Strib is awful PR decision making.
 

dpodoll68 said:
First the results, then the pay. Not the other way around.
Click to expand...

Athletes are paid based on potential instead of production all the time. Sometimes it works that way with coaches too. This is not a massive raise. He's still one of the lower-paid coaches in the conference.
 

dpodoll68 said:
We absolutely do live in that world. The salary paid for someone's services shouldn't be a penny more than what it costs to retain them. Richard Pitino thinks he can get paid more than $1.2 million elsewhere? I'd call his bluff in a second. We can do better. He has shown zero evidence whatsoever that he's capable of being a successful coach in the Big Ten. I mean, give me a break. He has a lower winning percentage in Big Ten games than Dan Monson.
Click to expand...

You're dreaming. And I don't think it's fair to look at it that way.

Let's play a hypothetical but not too unlikely scenario.

We pay Richard Pitino $1.2 Million, he walks in and demands a raise of $400k. Would it cost the university $400k to lose him? Extrapolate that over the remainder of his contract, say 3 years for simplicity, 1.2 Million. Would we lose the equivalent revenue because of a coaching change and possible continued decline of the team? Would we lose the opportunity for fundraising because of the perception of the program? Those are the decisions the board has to make. Playing chicken for the opportunity to save $400k isn't worth it in their eyes. Pay the kid his money, if he falters further, can him.

You call his bluff and he walks, what do you lose then?

Whether or not you can get someone better for 1.2 million is essentially irrelevant. It's the risk vs reward. Not big enough of a reward for the possible risk. I don't necessarily disagree with the idea that he doesn't deserve a raise based on performance. I think he can demand a raise based on market value.
 

howeda7 said:
Athletes are paid based on potential instead of production all the time. Sometimes it works that way with coaches too. This is not a massive raise. He's still one of the lower-paid coaches in the conference.
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Exactly. People are paid on potential all of the time. There is a base cost to get a competent B1G coach and NT feels he has such a coach, so you need to pay him what you expect, not the minimum that you can get away with. Last year is not a representative season on Pitino as a coach. You need to give him a few years with his players before you place judgement on his abilities as a coach. There are the typical GH Pitino haters that will not be happy unless he is fired, but the majority of us are willing to give him time to prove himself. I thing he will be an excellent coach and stay with the gophers for a long time. This season will be fun to watch.


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alchemy2u said:
People are paid on potential all of the time.
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Right - and that pay was $1.2 million. He hasn't earned a penny more until he produces something of value - like an NCAA Tournament appearance or a winning season in the Big Ten. As illustrated previously in the thread, he will now be getting paid more than Big Ten coaches who have done both of those things.
 

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