College Athletics Are a Rich Man's Game

Times are tough for the Average Joe. The national unemployment rate is 8.5% and continues to rise in the worst financial crisis to grip the country since the Great Depression.

Athletic departments are having to deal with budget issues as well, but according to a study earlier this year by Bloomberg, athletic directors appear to be prospering even in challenging times.

There are now 10 athletic directors who are paid more than $500,000 a year. Florida's Jeremy Foley leads the pack with a salary of nearly $1 million. Kansas' Lew Perkins pulls down $900,000 and Wisconsin's Barry Alvarez is paid $750,000.

Brett McMurphy of the Tampa Tribune compared the salaries to athletic department budgets. Perkins was the highest-paid athletic director in the Bowl Championship Series based on the percentage of his salary compared with the school's athletic department budget, which is $57.8 million.

Next was South Florida's Doug Woolard, right, who has an annual salary of $421,950 in a department with a budget of $34.7 million, second-lowest among Big East schools. Foley has the third-highest percentage, followed by Illinois' Ron Guenther and Georgia Tech's Dan Radakovich.

Bloomberg notes that most athletic directors enjoy other perks, such as country club memberships, cars and spousal travel to athletic events.

One surprising find was the salary of Nebraska's Tom Osborne. The former Cornhusker coach makes $261,000, which is third-lowest among athletic directors at BCS schools. Only the salaries of Mississippi State's Greg Byrne ($175,000) and West Virginia's Ed Pastilong ($240,750) were lower.

Outgoing Oregon athletic director Pat Kilkenny donates all but
$25,884 of his salary back to the school, according to Bloomberg.

A look at the average athletic director salaries by conference.

Comments

[BD]

Gasp, how horribly unfair for these people to make this much money!

Gimme a break. Should "we" void their contracts or give some of their pay back?

Is this supposed to be another log on the fire to fuel our rage that someone could make more money than the rest of us do?

College athletics is big business. Furthermore, most (I'll bet all of the departments mentioned in your post) are probably funded totally from the public or from donors and many of them probably contribute to their respective universities.

Prior to the last few months, if these athletic departments could not fund their operations, they either found new donors, scaled back their operations, or it was within the realm of possibility for them to shut down. In that case, nobody gets paid, including the ADs. Nowadays, I suppose they could convert to a bank and receive TARP funds.

If the public doesn't like how much their AD makes, send the school president a letter, stop buying tickets or university merchandise, etc. Furthermore, the media should stop offering up billion dollar contracts to cover sporting events.

On the other hand, if we don't like how much money we make, we should worry about improving our own lives instead of tearing down others to make ourselves feel better.

Have a great day,

BD

[Sean]

Let's see...most ADs are subsidizes by their own revenues. So if a guy runs a department that makes, say, $50 million...shouldn't he get a nice take? I really don't get this stuff. Let's not hate people for making money during tough economic times because its easy.

They earned the money, we as a society have placed the value on sports.

[wheaton4prez]

+1

We have enough knuckleheads in congress blaming their mistakes on the success of others. Soon, working hard to get ahead won't be worth it.

[arizona auto insurance]

I am surprised tiny Lawrence Kansas pays so well and wondering what Wisconsin has done to warrant paying their guy so much. At least Florida has won their share of football and basketball games.

[Gaming mouse]

They make money, thats how they warrant their pay. Winning, losing, whatever. If the team is making money, the players get paid bank; end of story.