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Acting Like A Leader

June 9, 2008 by Walking on Sunshine 

Here’s the situation:  You’re asked to provide an overall ranking of SEC basketball coaches based on coaching skills, leadership, recruiting and potential.

So…how would your list compare to this one?

Rank Coach School
1 Billy Donovan Florida
2 Billy Gillispie Kentucky
3 Kevin Stallings Vanderbilt
4 Bruce Pearl Tennessee
5 Trent Johnson LSU
6 Mark Gottfried Alabama
7 Rick Stansbury Mississippi St.
8 Andy Kennedy Ole Miss
9 Dennis Felton Georgia
10 Darin Horn South Carolina
11 Jeff Lebo Auburn
12 John Pelphrey Arkansas

At first glance, I think most people would say, “Stallings seems a little high.  Kennedy looks a little low.  And what the heck do you have against John Pelphrey?”

Now…if I take the same list and add another column….does it make more sense?  Does it surprise you?

Rank Coach School Salary *
1 Billy Donovan Florida $ 3,500,000
2 Billy Gillispie Kentucky $ 2,300,000
3 Kevin Stallings Vanderbilt $ 1,339,643
4 Bruce Pearl Tennessee $ 1,300,000
5 Trent Johnson LSU $ 1,200,000
6 Mark Gottfried Alabama $ 1,063,500
7 Rick Stansbury Mississippi St. $ 900,000
8 Andy Kennedy Ole Miss $ 800,000
9 Dennis Felton Georgia $ 760,000
10 Darin Horn South Carolina $ 750,000
11 Jeff Lebo Auburn $ 750,000
12 John Pelphrey Arkansas $ 750,000

* Salaries compiled from various articles and school web sites.

As you can see, one of the absolute embarrassments left by former Athletic Director Frank Broyles and former Chancellor John White is the salary of John Pelphrey.

Over the years, Broyles tended to be very frugal (to put it nicely) with the salaries of his head coaches.  And that only reinforced the perception that Arkansas was a ’stepping stone’ job for a head coach.  A nice job to ‘prove yourself’…but if you wanted to make some real money, you were going elsewhere.

John Pelphrey (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)Pelphrey’s current contract is heavily weighted with incentives — $1.2 million of incentives — based on higher achievement.

But Razorback Basketball with its tradition, facilities, and fan support should never pay a coach in such a manner.  Higher achievement should be expected at Arkansas, not be an incentive.

Plus…if a coach needs huge monetary incentives to work hard and win championships, chances are you don’t want him to be your coach anyway.  (About half of the SEC basketball coaches have incentives, but none run more than $400,000.)

With the hiring of Bobby Petrino, new Athletic Director Jeff Long has made a statement that under his leadership, Arkansas will take a back seat to no one.  The $2.85 million salary for Petrino ranks him among the top five coaches in the SEC.

So if you want to be the best, hire a hungry young coach like Pelphrey and pay him what an upper-tier SEC basketball program pays.  Then let the rest take care of itself.

I have no doubt Long will correct this mistake at the first available opportunity.  Razorback Basketball and John Pelphrey certainly deserve better.

Let’s just hope that happens before Pelphrey decides to step onto that ‘next stone.’

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Comments

10 Responses to “Acting Like A Leader”

  1. BACON BITS on June 9th, 2008 7:19 am

    WOW!!!
    Well, if Pelphrey gets this next group of hogs to the NCAA tournament (i.e freshman) consistently…………they better pay him or we’ll lose him faster than Rotnei Clarke’s jumpshot release!!!!!!!

  2. GonzoHog on June 9th, 2008 8:55 am

    Based on the exsperience Pelphrey had coming in, I’d say it’s about right. No offense Sunshine, but if it’s true that none of the other coaches make more than $400,000 in incentives, that means Pelphrey would rank third in money made behind Billy Gillespie for that year he achieved his incentives, at $1,950,000. I’m sure though, with his first year being somewhat of a sucsess, and coming through with a pretty darn good recruiting class, that his base salary is likely to come up a little. If you really want to see a guy getting a good screwin, just take a look at Rick Stansbury. $900,000 for all that he’s done at Miss. St.? Look at all the schools he has to compete against just to bring in a good recruiting class year in and year out. He come’s through though, and I can’t think of very many years his teams weren’t competing for a division or overall conference crown. The man know’s how to coach.

  3. Walking on Sunshine on June 9th, 2008 12:52 pm

    Gonzo, the point is:

    “…Razorback Basketball with its tradition, facilities, and fan support should never pay a coach in such a manner. Higher achievement should be expected at Arkansas, not be an incentive.”

    You want to be at the top….then act like it.

  4. T-towner on June 9th, 2008 2:06 pm

    I wonder what Florida paid Donovan the first year?

  5. 10KHog on June 9th, 2008 4:34 pm

    I disagree somewhat with the incentives comment Sunshine. I think a good incentives package is good. Now, maybe it is too big, but like Gonzo said, considering the experience Pelphrey has it’s not like he is Bobby Knight - although he might be more of his style. I think Coach P. is getting paid just the right amount. We had a senior - laden team that had the potential do a lot better than what we did. Winning an NCAA tournament game saved it from being another disastrous year. So, seeing as how it was one game that made the year I don’t think 750k is that bad.

    Fact is, we haven’t been “Arkansas Basketball” for many years and it doesn’t happen overnight. I guess you can say I’m still bitter for getting overjoyed with Stan Heath.

  6. Waldron Hog on June 9th, 2008 4:35 pm

    I’ve thought about this all day. My problem is not what we are paying our coach as much as we had to settle for an “up and comer”. Razorback basketball should be top of the line and not in “settle” mode.

    Don’t get me wrong. I like our coach and have faith he will bring us back. I just expect more.

  7. Smedlap on June 9th, 2008 9:33 pm

    Sunshine has interesting comments, but requires us to assume a lot of facts that may not be accurate. Sure the chart shows that Pelphrey is at the bottom in salary, but does that reflect a reluctance by the UA leadership to pay more than $750,000, or rather a reluctance by proven star coaches to come to Arkansas? Did Gillespie and Calipari turn us down due to salary, or did they in fact view their chances for high-level success to be better at at KY and Memphis? If either had said yes to Arkansas, would their salaries be $750,000 like Pelphrey’s, or would their salaries have been appreciably higher? I think we know the answers here. Arkansas basketball at one time was at or near the top. It fell a bit and now we are climbing back up. Sunshine’s analysis is interesting, but not despositive of the situation.

  8. OwassoHog on June 9th, 2008 10:24 pm

    Sure their salaries would have been higher but not high enough to keep them for long. It fact, other than Bobby, when have we paid close to the top in any league for any coach? I’m not saying that we haven’t but I certainly don’t remember do so since that just wasn’t Frank’s MO.

  9. GonzoHog on June 10th, 2008 9:54 am

    I think anytime you have to settle for less than what you origionally wanted, with an “up and comer”, compared to a proven coach with a big name,the coach that’s hired will have to settle for less, and I also agree with 10KHog that were not the same program we were in the ’90s. I will also agree that the incentives package could be a little big, and that the base salary should probably be around $50,000 higher. Reguardlees though of what your opinion is of the salary, were not the same program we used to be. We just like to think that we are. That’s why we failed so many times with the big-name coaches before we landed Pelphrey.

  10. BlindHog on June 14th, 2008 12:14 am

    I think you all have it just right. The big incentives where a sign of hope and respect, the low salary a nod to reality. Stan came in and accomplished very little in 5 years. Once John earns the incentives he can have the base equal to the incentives.