The SEC saw a nice financial bump in revenue in the first full year with Missouri and Texas A&M in the conference. USA Today, citing 2012 federal tax return information, reports the conference saw a $41 million bump in revenue up to $314.5 million. According to USA Today, SEC commissioner Mike Slive also saw a bump in pay. Slive was paid $1.2 million in 2012, up $230,000 from the previous year. Slive did not receive any bonus compensation in 2012.
The large share of the conference’s expenses accounted for conference distributions to each SEC member. According to the report, each SEC member already in the conference before 2012 received a payment of $21 million, an increase of about $400,000 from the previous year. Missouri and Texas A&M received a smaller share of $19.5 million, which was still roughly $7 million more than their final conference share as members of the Big 12.
Time will tell how Slive’s base salary compares to those of his conference commissioner cohorts, but his 2012 base pay was less than what the ACC paid John Swofford in 2011 (at least $1.6 million), what the Pac 12 paid Larry Scott ($1.575 million) and what Jim Delany received from the Big Ten ($1.3 million). Of course, bonus money that could be coming in the next year with the introduction of the SEC Network could change things a bit more.
The addition of the SEC Network likely will lead to increased revenue for the SEC, and thus larger shares to be distributed to all 14 SEC members. One of the reasons the Big Ten has been able to share high revenue shares is because of the Big Ten Network, but the SEC will have a different operating set-up and will have more control over the network and its revenue. The conference is still working to get the network in as many homes as possible for the launch later this year. As is usually the case when discussing television numbers and money, the more the better.