EAST LANSING, Mich. — In three seasons from 2013 to '15, Mark Dantonio won 36 of 41 games and two Big Ten championships. He got to major bowl games in three consecutive seasons and earned wins in the Rose Bowl and Cotton Bowl.
On Feb. 19, 2016, Michigan State announced it had reached agreement with Dantonio on a new version of his six-year, rollover contract that included a more than $600,000 raise in his annual pay to $4.3 million.
It also included the prospect of one of the largest one-time lump-sum bonuses in college football: a $4.3 million payment “in recognition of his long-service to the University” if he remained the Spartans’ coach through Jan. 15, 2020.
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“Michigan State’s football brand has never been stronger,” then-athletic director Mark Hollis said in a statement at the time. “We’re so excited about the future of our football program under Mark’s leadership and direction.”
Dantonio, in a statement, added: “Over the last three years, we have competed as one of the elite teams in the country. Our student-athletes have embraced this distinction as well as the expectations that accompany it. We will continue to dream big.”
Much has changed in the past 3½ years. And the winning has dried up since.
Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio has a 24-21 record since the start of the 2016 season. (Photo: Mike Carter, USA TODAY Sports)
MSU is 24-21 since the start of the 2016 season and has not won another Big Ten title. It endured Dantonio’s only losing season immediately after he received his pay bump. His program has been embroiled in off-field controversy with sexual misconduct convictions in two cases involving four former players and litigation since, including an ongoing federal civil lawsuit for wrongful termination of a former employee in which Dantonio is a defendant. Hollis and university president Lou Anna K. Simon, also defendants in that case, both resigned in the wake of the sexual assault scandal with former sports medicine doctor Larry Nassar that involved Michigan State and USA Gymnastics athletes.
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But in less than three months, Michigan State will owe Dantonio that one-time $4.3 million payment after he completes his 13th season. It’s not unusual for coaching contracts to include large payments designed to incentivize a coach to complete a full year or a period of years. Dantonio’s contract includes a $700,000 payment he gets annually if he is Michigan State’s head coach through June 30. Other coaches have arrangements that theoretically require them to complete more than one year, but also let them get a pro-rated amount if they get fired sooner for not winning enough games.
Dantonio’s prospective $4.3 million is an all-or-nothing proposition.
However, he and Michigan State have done this previously. In 2008, they amended their contract to add a $2 million payment if he stayed through Jan. 15, 2016. In 2011, they moved the triggering date for that payment forward by two years.
Michigan’s Jim Harbaugh matched that amount twice in 2016, when the university followed its promise to address deferred compensation with the split-dollar life insurance plan that resulted in a pair of $2 million payments that year. In 2017, Alabama’s Nick Saban, a former MSU coach, got a $4 million signing bonus with a contract extension.
Dantonio’s payment is not counted in this year’s USA TODAY Sports compensation survey because it is due on the first day his 2020-21 contract year begins.
But in the 2020 season, Dantonio would receive about $3.7 million (in his 2019-20 contract year, he’s basically getting $4.4 million) plus his one-time $4.3 million for a total of $8 million overall compensation, assuming nothing else changes with his contract or status as coach. (His yearly $700,000 bonus for remaining on the job each June 30 would resume in 2021.)
If Dantonio is fired or retires before Jan. 15, 2020, he is not due the $4.3 million. He would receive a $7 million buyout. Dantonio’s one-time payment is due around the same time he is expected to be deposed in court for his dismissal of former staff member Curtis Blackwell, who was alleged by the university to have not reported a sexual assault to the university’s Title IX office or police. A federal judge ordered the coach to face seven hours of questioning after MSU’s 2019 season is completed, but a firm date has not yet been scheduled.
Contact Chris Solari: [email protected] Follow him on Twitter @chrissolari.
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