What Can Brown Do For You? Texas Tops NCAA Football Money Makers
ByWhen is a college football coach who makes five million dollars a year considered underpaid? The answer is when his program generates a $65 million profit in one season.
The coach is Mack Brown and the program is the University of Texas.
Texas topped the list of money makers for the 2008-09 school year and did it in spectacular fashion. Their $65 million profit was $20 million more than the second best cash cow in the country, the Ohio State Buckeyes. Brown, whose wife is a highly respected real estate agent in the Austin area, received a $2 million bonus after leading the Longhorns to their second BCS Championship game in five years during the 2009 season. He will reportedly make $5 million a year through the life of his contract, which runs through 2016.
While most pundits will question how a coach can’t win in football-rich Texas, Brown’s supporters will point to the 20-year lull in success the Longhorns faced before Brown stepped on campus. With success on the field comes success in every financial area. More fans equal more parking, concession sales and season ticket holders. More wins equal more jersey sales and booster contributions.
But the most important cliché Brown has avoided during his tenure in Texas: More money equals more problems. A few of Brown’s players - Vince Young, Cedric Benson - may have had a few run-ins with the law after leaving Austin but Brown has avoided the big scandal that paralyzes many big time programs. Because of that, along with his success on the field, you would have to consider Brown’s contract as one of the best deals in college football today.
The only BCS programs to lose money during the 08-09 school year were UConn, Wake Forest, Syracuse and Duke. Rutgers broke even.
The rest of the Top 10 Money Makers (in Millions):
2. Georgia: $45.38
3. Florida: $43.29
4. Penn State: $42.63
5. LSU: $39.12
6. Notre Dame: $38.18
7. Alabama: $38.16
8. Nebraska: $37.29
9. South Carolina: $37.23
10. Ohio State: $35.89
