Bobby Hauck says he is not about to sign the three-year contract offered by the University of Montana last October.
That in itself is news, just as it would be if he signed what is a landmark deal for a state employee. Montana has been operating under one-year contracts since before Larry Donovan was a Husker, and it wasn't until last fall the Montana Board of Regents got a little more progressive.
Some basics are a base salary of $124,000 and change; and a buyout that is, gulp, 100 percent of the remainder of the deal should Hauck leave for another job.
“Those are the Š issues,” Hauck said Friday morning. “We aren't really even close to coming to an agreement on any of those matters.”
The base salary is a significant bump from the $100,000 Hauck was making, yet is it what the market dictates? Portland State pays Tim Walsh $133,000, to name one of the Grizzlies' league foes.
But Montana is a big fish in the Division I Football Championship Subdivision, let alone the Big Sky Conference, and new Georgia Southern coach Chris Hatcher is hauling in $200,000 in base salary. That figure grows to $250,000 thanks to a boost from the GSU boosters.
Reportedly, James Madison coach Mickey Matthews makes $178,000; and Southern Illinois coach Jerry Kill makes $165,000. Assuming most supplemental incomes (TV and radio deals, camps) are equal, Montana - which lost to JMU in the 2004 I-AA championship - isn't in that neighborhood.
“The goal in our football program isn't to be one of the pack in the Big Sky,” Hauck said. “The goal of our football program is to be an elite national team. Which is what we are and what we want to continue to be.”
The Griz, who lost in the FCS semifinals to Massachusetts in December, are consistently near the top of the rankings. They've gotten there under a series of coaches, most notably Don Read, who served out 10 one-year contracts and won 85 games at UM.
Looming bigger is buyout language that makes Hauck's penalty for leaving for a new job 100 percent of what's left on the contract. If Hauck had signed his deal in October, he was looking at nearly $375,000 owed when first Stanford, and then Minnesota set up interviews.
That is large. The implication has been whoever hires Hauck picks up the tab, but that's a lot to assume of Stanford. Les Miles reportedly had to pay a large part of his $1 million buyout when he left Oklahoma State for Louisiana State.
Portland State athletic director Teri Mariani said Walsh's contract calls for a buyout of $2,500 per month for the remainder of the 5-year deal he just signed, if he leaves. That's roughly 23 percent if he leaves right now. The percentage drops the longer he stays. There is no buyout on the fifth year.
Miles' buyout at LSU is $500,000, which dwarfs Hauck's. The difference is LSU is paying Miles $1,450,000 per year. Times that by seven years, and the buyout is five percent of his contract.
The trade-off is job security for Hauck and his assistants (Hauck said they, too, aren't happy with the new terms). If he gets dismissed, his salary is guaranteed for the length of the deal, or until he finds other employment.
Meanwhile, Hauck has been in the running for the jobs at Minnesota and Stanford. Yet if you were, for example, a pilot for Delta who then gets an overture for a rival airline that could pay, say, eight times your salary, you would listen. And if another airline - let's call it Air Idaho - offers twice the current salary, that may not be as enticing.
The point is, as UM athletic director Jim O'Day has said, successful coaches will have plenty of opportunities.
“I've poured four years of blood and sweat into the program,” said Hauck, who should have a fine football team in 2007. “People who insinuate that (he's actively looking to leave) would say that anyone in the business world shouldn't look at what the market is dictating.
“It's a two-way street.”
And the buyout language just doesn't fly. Nor do his assistants' salaries, including the $15,000 Steve Axman signed up for to be quarterbacks coach last fall. Axman's job will be filled by a graduate assistant, and Hauck also needs to replace Luther Carr - who left with Axman for Idaho - as well.
Hauck, 41-13 at UM's coach, could sign a one-year deal after signing day, which is Wednesday. It would be the first contract he's signed since August of 2005. Either way, he's the Grizzlies' coach.
“I intend to stay here a long time. What is that length? I don't know,” he said. “I love it here. It's a great place. There's nothing about the guys I work with or the kids I coach that would make me ever want to leave.”
Fritz Neighbor can be reached at 523-5247, or by e-mail at fneighbor@missoulian.com.
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