UT just went all in, big boy money

#76
#76
Did CRB also get salary adjustments for his Asst. Coaches...he lost his Lead Asst. before the UCLA hit the fan!

Barnes confident Vols can reach another level

Sources told ESPN that Barnes agreed to a new deal at Tennessee that will pay him in excess of $4 million next season and approach $6 million per year by the end of the contract. Barnes also received a larger salary pool for his assistants and staff as well as multiyear contracts for some of his assistants.

Barnes earned $3.25 million this past season after signing a new deal last September that would have increased by $100,000 each year of the contract. He would have owed Tennessee a $5 million buyout had he left, which UCLA was willing to compensate him for, at least in part, but the details of that compensation were still being negotiated.
 
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#78
#78
a coach who I believe has never won a post season tournament of any kind in 3 decades. Sheesh. Maybe all this money will make him a better coach in March.
Yet many were wanting the UTAD to back up the Brinks truck for Lane.
🤔
GBO!!
 
#79
#79
This is the first time in your lifetime Tennessee has ever gone all in on men’s basketball. Every other hire, good or bad have been stretches, bargain deals. Never before has the university made a serious investment in a coaching staff in basketball.
 
#81
#81
We
Awesome? I get your meaning, but I have to shake my head when people rejoice because we're spending even more money for a coach. I guess since fans don't receive a bill directly for his services it's lost the impact. When fans see seat prices go up, concessions go up, parking go up, etc, I hope they don't whine about it. Rejoice that we've now got to spend 4.7 million for a guy to coach a bunch of kids to play basketball. My word. It's akin to paying taxes. The fact that we don't have to write a check at the end of the year but instead the govt takes a bite every paycheck makes it something most folks ignore. They rejoice when they get a refund thinking it's free money from the govt. Pay that bill at the end of the year or better yet, in Nov right before elections and they'd damned well feel differently. Sorry for the rant. Again, not a slam on you. Just crazy that we wear spending that much money for a coach as something like a badge of honor. Like "we're UT. We pay top dollar for our coaching staffs". Just strikes me as a little...well...insane.

If we don’t pay it someone else will. So why not pony up the money to keep a coach that would have gotten the same else place. Being at the top of the league and coach of the year don’t come cheap.
 
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#82
#82
👆Horrible take, here.

Tennessee has spent years bargain shopping for basketball coaches. In a way, the worst thing to happen was that one of these bargain purchases paid off (Pearl) in terms of success and the previous powers And administration have spent the last few hires trying to replicate that. It’s about time Tennessee spend some money to keep a known success instead of trying to discover the possible next up-and-coming success.
Just look at Texas for example. They wanted a young up and coming coach and they elected to go after. Now look at them 5 years later and it’s obvious who made the better decision between Texas and Tennessee. Texas would have loved to have the success Tennessee had the last 3 years under Barnes than what they are currently having. Sometimes the grass is not greener on the other side.
 
#83
#83
UCLA only gave Cronin 4 mil a year -- though 6 years was too many for him, gonna be their Chip Kelly in basketball out there
 
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#85
#85
No. Not an individual award which means ZERO to the program, IMO. I'd prefer SEC championships, SECT titles, Final Fours, you know... stuff that actually matters.

Don't you think there's a connection between an actual coaching performance and an award of that nature? Further, don't you think a program needs to walk before it can run?

Never mind. I'm pretty sure I know what you think and I'm pretty sure we disagree. I hope you find a team to be happy about some day.
 
#86
#86
Don't you think there's a connection between an actual coaching performance and an award of that nature? Further, don't you think a program needs to walk before it can run?

Never mind. I'm pretty sure I know what you think and I'm pretty sure we disagree. I hope you find a team to be happy about some day.

There is really no reason to argue. It's futile. You and many others view "success" a certain way and that's cool. I've just always viewed "success" differently. By a higher standard. Now, that's not to say that this bball season was a failure. It was not. By a LONG shot. But we have nothing to show for a what could have been an exceptional season. I'd like to see what the teams' goals were that they set for themselves at the beginning of this season. I would venture that very few were actually met.
 
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#87
#87
you can't have it both ways.

can't complain about the ineptitude of the UT admin for the past decade....about it being cheap, and not willing to invest in winning, and having a championship level mentality when it comes to all it's sports.

and then complain about it when they do it.

either you don't care about winning and for some reason hiring the donnie tyndalls of the world is ok by you......or you really enjoyed the last two years and want to see that continue, or get better. you don't get that, doing things the old way.

did we over pay? yep. should we have? yep. why? because UCLA said Barnes was worth $5M.

carry on.
 
#89
#89
No. Not an individual award which means ZERO to the program, IMO. I'd prefer SEC championships, SECT titles, Final Fours, you know... stuff that actually matters.
So you don’t think that having the national coach of the year does anything for the program?
GBO!!
 
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#90
#90
Awesome? I get your meaning, but I have to shake my head when people rejoice because we're spending even more money for a coach. I guess since fans don't receive a bill directly for his services it's lost the impact. When fans see seat prices go up, concessions go up, parking go up, etc, I hope they don't whine about it. Rejoice that we've now got to spend 4.7 million for a guy to coach a bunch of kids to play basketball. My word. It's akin to paying taxes. The fact that we don't have to write a check at the end of the year but instead the govt takes a bite every paycheck makes it something most folks ignore. They rejoice when they get a refund thinking it's free money from the govt. Pay that bill at the end of the year or better yet, in Nov right before elections and they'd damned well feel differently. Sorry for the rant. Again, not a slam on you. Just crazy that we wear spending that much money for a coach as something like a badge of honor. Like "we're UT. We pay top dollar for our coaching staffs". Just strikes me as a little...well...insane.

I get the tax day argument. If you get a refund, you gave the government an interest free loan. I know people who like to use that refund as an equivalent as an extra paycheck or two.


With that said, the increases can easily be paid for by no changes in tickets, parking, concessions.... Keeping Barnes at a higher price did multiple things.

1- It is clear he is retiring here. We do not have to worry about some buyout with him down the road as the likelihood we fire him is very small. Even if it came to a point where we did fire him, it would be most likely due to a scandal or something with cause

2- It allows Tennessee basketball to declare war on the recruiting pipelines and build em up nationally now. Barnes has no choice, but to start recruiting with the best of them. His deal sets the tone for that.

3- Losing him to UCLA for any amount of money would immediately kill attendance, recruiting, and most likely send the next two years into a complete rebuild from scratch. That would cost the program more money than it would have to keep him. Keeping him likely increases program donations. Not sure the % increase but it will be there. Had we lost him and not found a Beard/Bruce type that would be seen as homerun, I'd argue we would have seen a % decrease in program donations.

The biggest "Pro" on the board with this deal is that it stabilizes the Athletic Department's finances even more so.

As long as we have the money, we could have made Barnes the highest paid coach in the country. It doesn't matter the price to keep him knowing his window is closing in terms coaching career in the next 4-6 years. We won't have to worry about extending him because there's no chance he would leave this contract and program to rebuild. If he was interested in that, he would have made this jump to UCLA and spent the next 4-6 years using the 4-5 star pull of UCLA to try to make runs.

The people who are saying we overpaid or that we are paying for a Sweet 16 coach have no idea on the business side of what keeping Barnes does for the next 4-6 years.

And it isn't their money for the most part so it isn't like they have a legitimate gripe outside of some faux outrage talking point.
 
#91
#91
to me, it's real simple...are we committed to having championship level athletics programs? yes or no?

if yes, it's going to require more money spent on investing in people....coaches and coaching resources.

if no, then see the last 12 years.

pick one. but don't complain about it after you choose.
 
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#92
#92
No. Not an individual award which means ZERO to the program, IMO. I'd prefer SEC championships, SECT titles, Final Fours, you know... stuff that actually matters.

All of it matters, even the stuff I guess you don’t like, or don’t want to consider. As all of it helps bring in recruits, and recruits is what will win games and that is the only way to get the “stuff that matters to you.”
 
#93
#93
to me, it's real simple...are we committed to having championship level athletics programs? yes or no?

if yes, it's going to require more money spent on investing in people....coaches and coaching resources.

if no, then see the last 12 years.

pick one. but don't complain about it after you choose.

UT wasn't invested in championship level basketball under Pearl? I would say go back to 2012.....
 
#95
#95
UT wasn't invested in championship level basketball under Pearl? I would say go back to 2012.....
either way. you got the gist of the point.....
edit: and i did say UT athletics, i wasn't singling out any particular sport....
 
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#96
#96
I'm glad Fulmer and Tennessee decided to pony up some big boy money. It bodes well for the future of the program and makes a statement to the rest of the country that we are taking winning seriously again. You think other coaches won't notice that when we need to make another hire?

Too long we've tried to go the frugal route when hiring coaches and ended up spending the money anyway on buyouts. So you're still paying the money but with nothing to show for it. How stupid is that?

So how does this work? Will coaches in the future average the offer they get with Barnes salary? Because the way you show you are committed to a coach is by offering a salary. It isn’t esoteric- you make an offer the amount the coach before you got doesn’t matter.
 
#98
#98
Not often, definitely not the norm, do you see a basketball coach making more than the football coach. Does this open the door for problems down the road? I don't have an opinion one way or the other...just think it's an interesting debate.
**Edit** of course Pruitt would have to produce for there to be an issue...

Rick Barnes actually got the Texas job because their first choic Rick majerus wanted more than Mack brown was making and Mack said he’d leave if that happened.
 
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#99
#99
Bruce Pearl was an up & comer coach that was really great! but he screwed the pooch! If we wanna run with the big boys, you gotta go get the big boy leaders and Barnes is the guy. Pay the Man. Time will tell for sure with Pruitt. I think he's on the right track. Football takes 22 starters and a whole lot of reserves compared to basketball. More time to get football ready. But BB ran with the big boys this year. We got closer than ever before. Rejoice and hope we make another run on the near future. I hope Grant comes back, pulls a Peyton Manning act and announces he's returning. Wouldn't that be great. But if he doesn't, wish him well. Barnes brought in some great UT Ambassadors and VFL's! I've had the best ride in UT Basketball in a long time!

We got closer than ever before being a bald face lie. Clearly you aren’t much of a basketball fan- we made the elite eight before.
 
Rick Barnes actually got the Texas job because their first choic Rick majerus wanted more than Mack brown was making and Mack said he’d leave if that happened.
That’s a callback! Thanks.
 

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