Today, The Knoxville News Sentinel reported that Tennessee would have to pay between $5.6 and $9.3 million to eject Derek Dooley and his staff from their jobs in Knoxville this season. If Auburn chose to blow up Gene Chizik, he and his staff would have large buyouts as well (the head coach’s alone is believed to be $7.5 million). Kentucky would have to fork over cash to Joker Phillips and his coaches as well.
But keep in mind that Southeastern Conference schools are about to come into some new money. A lot of new money.
Starting in 2014, the SEC will begin to reap the financial rewards from its new “Champions” Bowl game with the Big XII. In addition the biggest chunks of revenue from the television contract for the new college football playoff will be doled out to the biggest conferences… and the SEC is one of those big leagues. By 2014, the SEC will have also cut new deals with all of its bowl partners, adding some new ones, re-upping with some old ones. Expect those new agreements to require less ticket buy-back plans which will mean some SEC schools won’t actually lose money when they take large traveling parties to holiday contests.
In addition, an industry source told MrSEC.com this week that he expects the SEC’s new television deals (CBS, ESPN and a new SEC Network) to be worth an extra $10 to $15 million per school per year.
Add it all up and all 14 SEC schools should have more money spilling from their vaults — a lot more money — beginning in 2014. Might that impact the decisions schools make in 2012 regarding their current coaches? You’d certainly think so.
