Should Texas be worried about a Jimbo Fisher ending to Steve Sarkisian's new deal? | Bohls
So as expected, the Texas Board of Regents has approved head football coach Steve Sarkisian's contract extension that will make him college football's third highest-paid coach, raise his salary to $10.3 million and keep him with the Longhorns through the 2030 season.
Could this be a repeat of Jimbo Fisher Part II?
I don’t really think so because Fisher was trending downward and wasn’t well-liked in the Aggie department long before he was let go while the respected Sarkisian’s wins have gone from five to eight to 12 and Texas is looking like an early preseason contender in 2024
Personally I’m not a fan of guaranteed contracts and prefer big bonuses. Rather than fully guarantee his annual $10.3 million salary for six more years, which will grow to $10.8 million if not more by 2030, I would have preferred Texas bump Sark to, say, $8 million, representing a $2.2 million bump for one spectacular season, with a $2 million bonus if he wins it all.
But schools are in a hurry and starving for proven commodities, and there just aren’t many of those.
In addition, I repeatedly get told that’s the market.
Moreover, if Alabama had come on harder for Sark with a guaranteed contract and Texas only offered bonuses, he might be in Tuscaloosa today. The use of two cars and a personal plane for 20 hours were already in his old contract.
I do think Sark is the real deal for his organization skills, roster management, ability to lure big-impact quarterbacks and receivers and tailbacks and (mostly) his play-calling. Don't forget lmast year’s games against Washington and Houston (and Oklahoma in the last two minutes) and the 2022 showdown with TCU when Bijan Robinson got the ball only 12 times. And it’s a little scary when you think how close Texas came to losing to the Cougars but for a fortuitous first-down marker.
Lose that one, and there is no CFP appearance. But Nick Saban had a lucky play here and there, too, right, Auburn?
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Texas made the right choice in approving Steve Sarkisian's contract
