UGA football coach’s pay: Academics worth less than 1 percent

That imbalance is revealing.

Smart finishes up his defensive coordinator duties at Alabama in the college playoffs. He won’t coach UGA in its Jan. 2 bowl game against Penn State.

At Georgia, he’ll pocket a big raise, making at least $3.75 million annually. That’s 27 times more than what Georgia’s governor makes, but it’s unremarkable compared to the pay of other head coaches in the Southeastern Conference.

Smart also has a shot at a passel of performance bonuses.

He could get $1,550,000 extra for athletic kudos, like getting in big bowl games or being ranked among the five best teams in the nation.

But he'd snag just $50,000 extra for the only clear academic goal in his bonus plan — if players on the team rank in the top third among SEC schools for graduation and eligibility rates. (The team isn't close to making that goal, according to the latest NCAA stats I found).

So, bonuses for athletic excellence are about 30 times as large as for excelling academically. In all, academic bonuses account for less than 1 percent of Smart’s combined regular pay and bonus potential.

Think about that the next time some NCAA or university official talks about how seriously they take academic support for “student-athletes.”

What’s the message?

I asked UGA athletic director Greg McGarity what message is conveyed by academics being less than one one-hundredth of Smart’s pay.

He texted me that it shows “an emphasis on academics is an essential part of the expectations of a head coaches’ responsibility, and there are rewards for going above and beyond what is expected.”

Richard Southall has a different interpretation.

“Academic bonuses are public relations window dressing,” said Southall, a professor who leads the College Sport Research Institute at the University of South Carolina. “Universities like giving some paltry sum because then they can say it is about education.”

“I’m not saying coaches don’t care (about the education of players),” Southall told me. “But they are not incentivized to the same degree.”

Big college football programs were not created to give 125 players a path to higher education. Instead, they are giant entertainment and marketing machines, said Ellen Staurowsky, a sports management professor at Drexel University.

Football boosts a university’s image. It gets donors to give, politicians to fund and potential students to apply.

Pay-for-play

Staurowsky doesn't think coaches should get academic bonuses, since that's not really their primary job focus. Instead, she said college players should be treated as employees who can be fully compensated for their play. (The NCAA hates this idea.)

One guy who used to complain about the ratio of coach bonuses tied to athletics versus academics is former NBA-player, former congressman and former University of Maryland regent Tom McMillen.

He and now-outgoing U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan pushed universities to take a closer look at coach pay.

But McMillen said athletic directors told him that academic achievements can be skewed by students recruited by previous coaches, who often bring in low-achieving students (as this earlier Atlanta Journal-Constitution report shows). And he was told coaches are expected to ensure their players succeed academically, whether or not they receive a bonus for it.

Now, the University of Maryland bars coaches from receiving any bonus unless the team meets an academic threshold for player graduation and eligibility rates.

The threshold isn’t high. It’s set at the minimum required by the NCAA for coaches to avoid limitations on practice hours or post-season play.

But “it’s a start,” said McMillen who recently was hired to lead the Division 1A Athletic Directors’ Association.

Meanwhile, incentives vary nationwide. Georgia Tech football coach Paul Johnson’s contract sets potential academic bonuses at $200,000, four times those for UGA’s coach.

Academic Achilles heel

The NCAA knows academics of football and basketball players is a potential Achilles’ heel. So players — whose athletic responsibilities often are like holding a full-time job — are assigned academic support staff to help them to stay on track. No coach wants to lose a starter over academics, and I suspect most want players to get a good education, though I’m sure they don’t want it to infringe on game performance.

McGarity, the UGA athletic director, texted me that coaches and other staff understand that helping players do well academically “is a top priority, and if they were not fully committed to this responsibility, their time at UGA would be very short. Coaches also understand that student-athletes can’t participate in competition unless their academic responsibilities are fulfilled; therefore, it’s a huge deal.”

It seems apparent that Richt was ousted for not winning enough big games.

What I hadn’t realized until I checked the stats is that Richt’s team actually lagged even more in academics, ranking ninth out of 14 SEC teams based on the NCAA’s most recent Academic Performance Rate.

Pay for performance has its limits. Bonuses might work as rewards that make people feel valued. They might serve as carrots when negotiating pay packages. And, if they are big enough, they might send messages about what businesses — or university athletic departments — value.

But they probably aren’t great at making coaches more likely to win big games. Or having team players graduate.