Jacobs Doubles Down on Malzahn

Auburn’s athletic director Jay Jacobs sprang news on the sporting world last week that Gus Malzahn had been given a contract extension. The paper was signed back on April 1st giving Coach Malzahn a one-year contract extension until 2020. Basically, money was shifted around so that Gus would be paid more in the coming years and less on the back end of his contract. Under his new deal, Malzahn would be paid $4.725 million per year through Dec. 31, 2020, which would make the Auburn football coach rank among the top-ten salaried coaches.

The pay structure jockeying is open to debate, and there are positives and negatives for both sides. However, the fact that Auburn is now under contract for that additional year means the university would also be indebted to Malzahn for an extra year should he be let go. If that were to happen, Auburn’s football coach would be owed $2,237,500 per year on his remaining contract. 

The situation appears similar to that of the ridiculous contract given to Gene Chizik after winning the 2010 National Championship. Perhaps only Notre Dame and the Charlie Weiss breakup could rival Chizik’s big payday departure from Auburn. 

Please don’t misunderstand. I want to see Coach Malzahn succeed, but you have to wonder if Malzahn fails to win more than eight games in 2016, will he remain Auburn’s coach? Even if he were to be retained, what are the chances of Gus being at Auburn through 2020? With college football reaching unprecedented heights, the statistics on coaching turnover work against Malzahn remaining at Auburn for that amount of time, regardless of success. 

The situation has raised a lot of questions about “why now” and “what ifs.” Why give him an extension after a disappointing 2015 season? Did some school such as Baylor test the waters about hiring him away from the Plains? If Malzahn rattles off three amazing seasons between now and 2020, what will happen at the end of this deal? Is Jacobs prepared to pay Malzahn over $7M a year? 

The biggest question? Why didn’t Jacobs learn from the Chizik separation? One could say that he has already made the same mistake, and this would his second gaffe should Malzahn not succeed.

On the eve of the SEC Championship game in 2013, Jacobs and Malzahn came to new terms that would catapult the coach into being one of the top paid coaches in college football. While most fans acknowledged the great job Malzahn and company did in their first year, many eyebrows were raised at the numbers on the new deal. Overnight Malzahn went from a steal of a deal to a top-ten paid coach. Since then, has the juice been worth the squeeze? How much more can Auburn afford to pay a coach?

Sure, the AD said Malzahn would be the Tigers coach for a “long, long time.” That doesn’t necessarily mean that Malzahn would be around because of the job he was doing.

Jacobs likely isn’t just doubling down on Malzahn. He may be doubling down on his own future. I believe Gus Malzahn is the only reason that Jacobs is still Auburn’s AD. He was on shaky ground after Chizik’s 3–9 final season, and without the 2013 SEC Championship and the appearance in the BCS National Championship game, he might have been out as athletic director. As it has been said elsewhere, Auburn’s big revenue sports have been terrible for half a decade. Baseball is a bottom feeder, and the situation with Sonny Golloway is a mess. Bruce Pearl’s squad didn’t make any headway last season after knocking off Kentucky and Alabama before dropping 14 straight. Jacob’s lone hire that is a proven winner? Softball coach Clint Myers.

While fans are enamored with Auburn’s first time appearance in the finals of the Women’s College World Series, it is less about how good they are and more about being the only good team fans can watch. As great as the softball team’s World Series appearance was, women’s sports won’t save Jacob’s job, which is why this writer believes he offered Malzahn the new contract. It isn’t about keeping Gus for a long, long time. It isn’t about wins. It’s about the money. The more money Jay Jacobs commits now is a simple investment in his future. 

If this year’s football team doesn’t win and Auburn were to fire Jacobs, might not a new AD hire a new football coach? Auburn would then be on the hook for buyouts to both Malzahn and Jacobs. The people in charge obviously know that, which makes firing Jacobs an incredible risk. In terms of dollars and cents, it would be cheaper to be a middling program than a bankrupt one. 

Of course that raises the question, if the powers that be know this, why do they let it continue?

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