In 1997 Ole Miss athletic director Pete Boone came up with a scheme to offer head football coach Tommy Tuberville a 10-year contract. The athletic foundation would fund and guarantee the contract to get around the state’s four-year employment contract limit.
When Chancellor Robert Khayat pitched it to the IHL board a number of us on the committee considering the request expressed concerns. First, the scheme would violate the state constitution four-year limit on IHL contracts. Second, it would set a bad precedent resulting in a slew of long-term coach and athletic director contracts, something we saw as bad business practice. We also voiced concerns about institutional control and university liability. The Chancellor withdrew the request. Pete left perturbed. And the next year Tuberville abandoned Ole Miss for Auburn.
Twenty-five years later it appears the IHL Board may allow a similar scheme to keep another coach away from Auburn.
While the details of Lane Kiffin’s contract have not yet been made public, Sports Illustrated’s Ross Dellenger reported it would have a six-year base and get around the four-year limit by running the contract through Ole Miss’s private athletics foundation. Another report had the contract length at eight years and funded through “a private foundation.”
While athletic foundations may pay most or all of football coaches’ salaries, they do not employ coaches. The universities do. When I served on the IHL Board in the 1990s we required athletic foundation funds to pass through the universities to the coaches, i.e., no direct payments to coaches. That made it abundantly clear that coaches were university employees and subject institutional control.
While news reports cited state law as the issue with contract limits, it’s actually the state constitution. Section 213-A reads in part: “Such board shall have the power and authority to elect the heads of the various institutions of higher learning, and contract with all deans, professors and other members of the teaching staff, and all administrative employees of said institutions for a term not exceeding four (4) years.”
State law and IHL Board policy both simply repeat the constitutional provision.
The Legislature could have removed the four-year limit, but hasn’t. In 2018, State Sen. Josh Harkins got the Senate to pass Concurrent Resolution 547 to delete the four-year limit language. However, the resolution died in the House.
Just weeks ago Ole Miss Vice Chancellor for Intercollegiate Athletics Keith Carter told the North Jackson Rotary Club the four-year limit on coaching contracts was a good thing. Mississippi universities have been able to roll over four-year contracts annually for good coaches, but avoid lengthy payouts when choosing to fire bad coaches.
If the IHL Board has now decided to wink and nod at the constitution and allow athletic foundations to contract with coaches for longer terms, it will have significant consequences. Next up will be academic foundations offering long-term contracts to presidents et al.
Got to keep them from moving to Auburn too.
“A person is praised according to their prudence” – Proverbs 12:8.
Crawford is a syndicated columnist from Jackson.
26 comments:
Paying these insane salaries is plain stupid. But if private money is paying for it, have at it. If a big donor wants to guarantee year 5 and 6, what interest does the state have in it? And if presidents get in on the gig, and we are stupid enough to go for it, I still don't care, as long as it is not my tax money.
Does our state not have enough problems for Crawford to opine about without having to pick apart a coach's contract?
Ole Miss is so proud of its endowment fund, why not use it to guaranty coaching long term contracts, they certainly aren’t using it for anything else like “god forbid” reducing the cost to attend that “Hallowed Institution”
11:01 -- Crawford is right. Yes, the contracts should be public and the public has a right to pick them apart. Remember, these are PUBLIC funded universities and just because private money is added to the till, it is must remain under the control of the state.
Anyone surprised UM doesn’t want to follow the rules?
You do realize that the university of Mississippi is considered the poorest town in Mississippi based on the income of the residents. Would you want to move your family there?
It's not that Crawford is right - He's simply quoting the state constitution and the limits thereof. Donors have no right to hand out apparel, cars, cash, fishing trips, motel rooms, double-wides for mommas or extensions of state contract limits. If they want to kick in nineteen million during the term of a valid contract, fine. They're stupid, but that's fine.
They do not and will not have the ability to extend the term of a state limited contract. The coach is employed by the institution, not buy a bunch of automobile dealerships, lawyers or clothing outlets.
Not seeing the value in this Kiffen.
College athletics is no longer amateur sports. I bemoan that it is about money.
Having said that, for anyone to criticize only Ole Miss is ridiculous. Throw MSU, USM and all other major colleges.
By the way, it has been grand for Mississippi to have Deion Sanders, Mike Leach and Lane Kiffin as our coaches. MS has the most colorful coaches in the US.
RMQ
I don't think Crawford EVER voted NOT to increase tuition.
2:47 you got your you don’t think part right.
Jealousy is a cruel master, and will not spare in a time of mercy. There is a lot of jealousy being exhibited in these comments.
1:14, even state fans recognize how asinine your comment is. Our college towns are the best thing we have going in this state.
11:31, if I call up Kiffen and tell him I’ll give him $10 million to stick around a year beyond his contract, the state nor its constitution can stop me. And why do you care?
But it’s still stupid.
Forget coaching contracts; IHL does far more harm than good meddling in academics and medicine and anything else they want to control. They are literally an unqualified board of political appointees running state affairs. Get rid of the lot…
5:34 - the point here is that you can offer $10 million but you cannot extend the four-year contract, no matter how many dealerships you own. Sorry you don't see the point of the discussion.
You do realize that the university of Mississippi is considered the poorest town in Mississippi based on the income of the residents.
Dumbest, most inaccurate post of the entire year. First, the University of Mississippi is not a town. Second, if you're talking about Oxford, you're nuts.
The private foundations are guaranteeing the buyouts. That university itself is only on the hook for 4 years of salary. It’s not illegal. Why do people care what private people do with their own money. It’s no one else’s business.
A whole lot of moving the goal post(pun intended) to overpay a coach that lost 4 of his last 5 games after breezing through a cupcake schedule to start the year. But what do I know? They may like his trolling Twitter posts.
"That university itself is only on the hook for 4 years of salary. It’s not illegal."
For the fiftieth time...What's illegal is a contract that goes beyond the state limit of four years. Please pay attention.
1:14 PM - University, Mississippi is "poor" - maybe because there are no residents? But a quick google search will tell you that median income for Oxford is higher than Jackson, Hattiesburg, Starkville, and Cleveland.
Attn 1:14 PM what does Oxford have to do with OleMiss’s net worth. I could live next door to a billionaire, but it would not make me rich. Once again the “Ole Miss” arrogance rears it’s ugly head! Arrogance personified!!!!!!!
12:28 - The comments regarding Oxford income are in answer to the ridiculous comment that Ole Miss is the poorest town in the state. That post is repeated below in THIS post.
It's not arrogance to point out the absurdity of that claim. And I'm an MSU graduate and fan.
"You do realize that the university of Mississippi is considered the poorest town in Mississippi based on the income of the residents. Would you want to move your family there? December 4, 2022 at 1:14 PM
@December 5, 2022 at 8:45 AM
I would be shocked if the university is signing a contract that extends past 4 years on it's face unless they want it to be rejected.
There is going to be a four year contract with the state. There is going to be a separate contract between a private entity and Kiffen that sets out certain obligations and damages if Kiffen voluntarily leaves during whatever period or if the University does not offer him a new contract covering whatever period beyond the initial 4 years.
@2:54 - That still does not make it an eight-year contract.
@3:48AM
It makes it an 8 year contract with the private entity and a 4 year contract with the University. But from the coach's perspective, it functions the same as an 8 year contract with the school. He'll either be coaching for the school or getting paid a buyout. It will just be the private entity with the buyout obligation rather than the school.
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