The Protect College Sports Act passed a major milestone with Senate approval on Monday, and with it comes more discussion on coach and player earnings in college football. The new bill would grant the NCAA legal authority to enforce a $50 million "salary cap" for athlete compensation, with $22.5 million earmarked for player retention and $5 million reserved for women's and Olympic sports. While the new legislation would set a limit for what players can earn, coaches don't face the same salary ceiling.
One late-proposed amendment to the bill would have capped coaches' salaries at $5 million per year, well below what many Power Four programs currently pay their leaders. The amendment didn't pass, but it has sparked more discussion around the difference between player and coach payments. Count Nick Saban among those who believe players and coaches aren't on the same pay grade.
"These things are totally different markets," Saban said on ESPN Tuesday. "That's like asking me, does a student's scholarship equal the professor's pay? How much value does a coach create for a university?" The six-time national-champion coach does have some ideas on how to rein in schools' spending on coaches, though.
He would like to see an end to exorbitant contract buyouts that often force schools to pay coaches for years after they depart a program. "I think the better way to control that is contracts," Saban said. "Rather than worry about amount of money people make, I think the thing that has been difficult is when coaches get fired, and they have these huge buyouts.
And everybody says, 'well how can the university afford to pay him that?' I think you can figure, okay, you can't have any more than a five-year contract or the buyout can only be so much. Saban's never been against players making money in college football, even though that was widely speculated to be one of the reasons he decided to retire after Alabama's 2023 season. This morning on ESPN's First Take, Nick Saban argued player and coach pay are "totally different markets.""That's like asking me 'Does a student's scholarship equal the professor's pay?' I mean, how much value does a coach create for a university?" 📺 💰️ pic.twitter.com/LwFkU6eGeF He reiterated on Tuesday that his career had simply run its course and that he was ready to do something else with his time.
"We had three years of this, you know, my last three years," Saban said. "I coached in the NFL, so I was used to managing the salary cap and that type of thing. But I think that it was just time for me, 72 years old.
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