When Sam Pittman confirmed in December that he switched from Arkansas-based agent Judy Henry to super agent Jimmy Sexton, you could practically hear the groans from Fayetteville. Sexton’s clients don’t work for cheap. Nick Saban and Jimbo Fisher are proof of that. Pittman being on an extremely team-friendly contract with an annual compensation that ranked No. 12 of 13 public SEC university football coaches was set to be a thing of the past with Sexton on board.

Technically, those days are over with Pittman’s new contract, which was announced on Thursday. But dare I say, he’s still a massive bargain.

A new $5 million base salary is up from the $3 million that Pittman made in 2021. It’s the richest base salary in the history of Arkansas athletics, which might seem like a risky financial play for someone with 2 years of experience as an FBS head coach.

Just like his first deal, though, Pittman’s contract is loaded with incentives (H/T 247sports).

  • Graduate 80-89% of players with exhausted eligibility — $12,500
  • Graduate 90% of players with exhausted eligibility — $25,000
  • Earn SEC Coach of the Year — $25,000
  • Earn National Coach of the Year — $50,000
  • Reach Tier 3 bowl — $100,000
  • Appear in SEC Championship — $100,000
  • Reach Tier 2 bowl — $150,000
  • Reach New Year’s 6 bowl — $250,000
  • Win SEC Championship — $250,000
  • Win 7 games — $250,000 (extra year added to contract)
  • Win 8 games — $500,000 (extra year added to contract)
  • Win 9 games — $750,000 (extra year added to contract)
  • Earn Playoff berth — $750,000
  • Win national title — $1,000,000

If at any point on the contract Arkansas wins 7 games — inclusive of a bowl game against a Power 5 or Top 25 team — then he gets an extra year added to the end of the deal. His annual base salary would also get a $250,000 bump to go from $5 million to $5.25 million for the remainder of his contract (2023-27).

If Pittman wins 8 games in 2022, each of his remaining years left on this new deal will get a $500,000 bump to go from $5 million to $5.5 million in base pay. For a 9-win season, his remaining base salary would get a $750,00 increase to go from $5 million to $5.75 million for the next 5 years.

There are also 3 different times in which Pittman can receive retention bonuses. If he’s still Arkansas’ coach on Dec. 31, 2024, he’ll receive $3,300,000. On Dec. 31, 2026, that number is $2,700,000 and on Dec. 31, 2027, that number is $1,500,000 as long as the contract is extended. Pittman has a non-compete within the conference, meaning he cannot leave for another SEC head coaching job unless he’s fired by Arkansas.

Oh, and one last thing. Just as his original deal outlined, Pittman’s buyout is performance-based. If fired without cause, he’s owed 75% of his remaining contract. However, if Pittman’s record is below .500 when he’s fired, he’s only owed 50% of his remaining contract.

That’s significant because it essentially saves Arkansas’ money if Pittman collapses. Based on the fact that the guy just delivered the program its best season in a decade, nobody is expecting that. Of course, things can change in a hurry. Arkansas knows that all too well. In less than 2 years, Chad Morris went from being the promising hire from the Dabo Swinney tree to being the guy who got a $10 million buyout after failing to win an SEC game.

Morris is the context needed to show why Pittman’s 12-11 record is far more impressive than it would suggest. The Hogs went from being the laughing stock of the league to beating Texas A&M, LSU, Texas and Penn State in the same season. Pittman’s well-documented turnaround isn’t just a great story. He’s the reason Arkansas climbed out of the SEC dumpster and is now as stable as ever with Texas and Oklahoma set to create the SEC’s super conference.

In that super conference, a $5 million coach is standard. In the SEC alone, there were 9 coaches who made at least $5 million in 2021. In FBS, there were 22 coaches at that mark in 2021 (not including the unknown terms of Brian Kelly’s contract at Notre Dame):

  • Nick Saban, Alabama
  • Ed Orgeron, LSU
  • Jimbo Fisher, Texas A&M
  • Dan Mullen, Florida
  • Kirby Smart, Georgia
  • Mike Leach, Mississippi State
  • Bryan Harsin, Auburn
  • Lane Kiffin, Ole Miss
  • Mrk Stoops, Kentucky
  • Dabo Swinney, Clemson
  • Lincoln Riley, Oklahoma
  • Gary Patterson, TCU
  • Steve Sarkisian, Texas
  • Ryan Day, Ohio State
  • James Franklin, Penn State
  • Pat Fitzgerald, Northwestern
  • Mel Tucker, Michigan State
  • Scott Frost, Nebraska
  • Kirk Ferentz, Iowa
  • David Shaw, Stanford
  • Chip Kelly, UCLA
  • Kyle Whittingham, Utah

It’s important to see how long that list is because somewhere, there are Arkansas fans with sticker shock. I get it. Paying a coach $5 million — and probably closer to $6 million annually if he continues at this pace — is somewhat daunting.

Let me show you why it’s not quite as daunting as it could be.

In the worst-case scenario, Pittman falls apart the next 2 years. Arkansas misses a bowl game in consecutive years and it finds itself back in the SEC West basement. Just hypothetically speaking, that worst-case scenario would include the Pittman-Hunter Yurachek relationship falling apart. Instead of Pittman being the beloved, hog statue-owning guy who loves Hot Springs and bulldogs, he becomes public enemy No. 1.

Per the current terms of Pittman’s contract, that would mean he finishes with a sub-.500 record. Ergo, only half of that buyout is owed. If he didn’t hit 7 wins in those next 2 seasons, his base pay would still be at $5 million, which would mean after the 2023 season, he would still be owed roughly $15 million. Yurachek could fork over a $7.5 million buyout and move on to the next coach.

Arkansas fans know all too well that $7.5 million is chump change in terms of coaching buyouts. In a time when the majority of Power 5 head coaches have buyouts north of $10 million, getting out of that contract after 4 years would be extremely manageable. And again, we’re talking about the disaster scenario.

Consider that another reason why this is an excellent contract for all parties.

Pittman’s deal is loaded with incentives, but having $5 million in base pay assures him that he’s not hung out to dry if Arkansas gets decimated by injuries and it goes 6-7. Arkansas doesn’t have to worry about any world in which Pittman’s people even entertain a phone call for another SEC job. On top of that, it essentially has built-in, incentive-based raises AND extensions.

Think of the value Arkansas would still be getting if Pittman led a Playoff berth. That scenario would include about $2 million in bonuses for Pittman to net him around $7 million (that’s what Dan Mullen made in 2021). For a program who hasn’t finished in the top 4 of the AP Poll since the first year of the Jimmy Carter administration, that check would be worth writing 100 times out of 100.

Pittman already made good on Yurachek’s investment in him back in 2019. It didn’t matter to Pittman that he wasn’t their first choice. He admitted that he didn’t have much leverage when he negotiated that first contract, which was highly scrutinized by the outside world.

This time, though, things were different. Pittman earned that.

Once a bargain, still a bargain.