Stan Geiger

Coach Pay: Inflation to the Max

Ted Owens, Kansas' head basketball coach from 1964-1983, was in KTUL's studios for a little chitchat last night. I am indebted to him for giving me some insight on just how ridiculously meteoric the rise in pay for college coaches has been over the years.

Owens was asked about Sean Sutton. He offered the standard condolences, one coach to another. But then he chuckled as he noted the $4 million Sutton walked away with should ease the pain of the firing somewhat.

I was dismayed by that comment. OSU has, according to Owens, agreed to pay Sutton's contract in full. Reports say Sutton had a 5-year deal at $750,000 per year. He worked two; he gets paid for five. The tab comes to $3.75 million. Roughly speaking, Sean Sutton was paid nearly $2 million for each year in which he coached a team that stunk up the joint.

I argued, in a recent piece, that coaches should not be working under contract. Not those at taxpayer-subsidized schools, at least. Mr. Sutton's deal provides rationale for that argument.

I hear daddy is all upset and may insist that his name be taken off the basketball court. He's upset with the fact that his son put millions in university money in his pocket? Please.

If he wants his name off the court, take it off. I see no reason for it to be there in the first place.

Meanwhile, there is a fellow whose name is on the building, Gallagher, that is deserving of such an honor. And that leads me into what you might think is a digression, but it's not. Hang with me.

Here's a paragraph from a Wikipedia page on OSU wrestling:

Oklahoma State's 34 national championships is currently the most championships ever won by a program in the NCAA. Statistically, Oklahoma State wrestling is the most dominant program of any sport at the collegiate or professional level.

You are to be forgiven if you were unaware of OSU's decades-long dominance in the sport of wrestling. I am an OSU grad, and I wasn't aware. I've known since my days at the school, mostly in the late '70s, that OSU has always been strong in wrestling. But, my goodness, 34 freakin' national championships? That's stunning.

A couple of years back, OSU completed a string of 4 consecutive national championships in wrestling. But, if you're like me and you rely mostly on local TV stations for your sports information, that fact might have escaped your attention. It barely got mention.

If your intuition is telling you I'm about to complain of the local media's bias toward OU, it's right.

I watch the local news on most nights. When it comes time for the sports, mention is made of Bob Stoops, Sam Bradford, Sherri Coale, Courtney Paris, Jeff Capel and Blake Griffin, then comes a brief reminder that there is, in fact, another state university in Stillwater, then comes about 5 minutes of commercials followed by a discussion about Tiger Woods.

OU's football team can hang half a hundred on a weakling and the local news guys get so excited they pee their pants. OSU wins 4 straight national titles in wrestling and it's a footnote.

Okay, that's enough of that. Back to real business.

Edward C. Gallagher took over as the OSU wrestling coach in 1929. The Pokes promptly won the first ever NCAA Division I national wrestling championship. The trend continued. Gallagher died in 1940---with 8 national championships to his credit.

Gallagher was replaced by a fellow named Art Griffith. Griffith was hired out of Tulsa Central High School. That fact caught my eye because, in addition to being an OSU alum, I'm a graduate of old Tulsa Central. But it also caught my eye because I found it interesting that the dominant college wrestling program in the nation went to a high school to find a successor to its late legendary coach.

It should be noted that, back in the day, Central was no ordinary high school. It was one of the top high schools in the nation. Athletically, it dominated the state. Those days are, I'm afraid, long gone. But there was a time.

In addition, Griffith's record was sparkling. In 15 years at Central, his teams won 94 of 100 duals---including 50 in a row at one point. But still, Griffith was a high school coach. Would he be able to step up in class, and be as successful at OSU as he was at Central?

Well, let's see.

When Griffith took over, OSU had won 4 straight national titles. That streak was extended to 7 in a row. When Griffith took over, OSU had won 27 consecutive duals. That streak was extended to 76 in a row. A little math tells one that Griffith's teams won 49 duals before losing one.

At the time of his retirement, Griffith's teams had a combined dual record of 78-7-4. That's a winning percentage of 87.6 percent. Griffith's teams won 8 national championships in his 13 years as coach---including 3 in a row in his last 3 years.

So a high school coach took over the top college wrestling program in the nation and that program didn't skip a beat. Very clearly, you don't have to have the million-dollar baby superstar coach to be successful.

In the annals of college sports history---or any sports history, for that matter---it would be hard to find anyone that can match the records of the two dudes mentioned above. How much do you reckon they were paid?

And you thought I was engaging in pointless rambling. Shame on you.

I must confess, I have no idea how much these two great coaches were paid. But I think it's a safe bet that they were not made multimillionaires. They were coaches. They were coaches at a taxpayer-subsidized institution. And, back in their time, this country acted like it had some sense.

I've often wondered about coaches' pay in the old days. I mean Bud Wilkinson put OU football on the map. He won back-to-back national titles. And he won 47 games in a row---a record that still stands. If you took his pay, adjusted it for inflation, and compared it to that of Bob Stoops, how would it stack up?

Ted Owens, as I mentioned at the start, gave me some insight last night.

Chris Lincoln put a question about how much Owens was paid when he first took the job at Kansas in 1964. I hope Lincoln asked that question for a reason. I really do. And if he did, I give him props.

Owens said his salary was $10,000.

I can hear the youngsters snickering. But actually, 10 grand wasn't bad pay in '64. It was a middle-class wage. In inflation-adjusted terms, just roughly guessing, I'd say it was the equivalent of about $70,000 today.

Let's compare and contrast. Up the road in Norman, Jeff Capel was just given a contract that guarantees him $1.05 million a year. So Capel is guaranteed to make 15 times the salary Ted Owens was paid in '64---in inflation-adjusted terms. And that's just the base salary---extras not included.

It's crazy, it's madness, and it has to stop.

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