Coming off a Big Ten championship and an appearance in the College Football Playoff, Michigan State is reportedly set to pay Mark Dantonio and his coaching staff like kings.
A breaking report from Hondo Carpenter of Spartan Nation, Michigan State officials are believed to be preparing to finalize significant raises for Dantonio and his coaching staff. According to the report, Michigan State and Dantonio have been working behind the scenes to come together on the finer details of the pay upgrades as they find the numbers that work for Michigan State, Dantonio and his staff. There is no timeline for when the new contract details will be announced, although it could happen soon.
In 2015, Dantonio was the nation’s 21st highest-paid coach, earning $3,671,520 before bonuses. That put Dantonio fifth among Big Ten coaches in salary, trailing four coaches he defeated in 2015; Jim Harbaugh ($7 million), Urban Meyer ($5.86 million), James Franklin ($4.4 million) and Kirk Ferentz ($4.075 million). Aside from Meyer, no coach in the Big Ten has accomplished as much as Dantonio, with a pair of Big Ten championships to his name and victories in the Rose Bowl and Cotton Bowl in recent seasons. Michigan State’s staff salary ranked 24th in the nation last season with a combined salary of $3,195,154. This also ranked fifth in the Big Ten, trailing the same four schools; Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State and Iowa.
Michigan State has not traditionally stayed ahead fo the curve when it came to Dantonio’s contract, but base don the level of performance the football program has achieved over the past few years it is wise to make sure that is no longer the case. This is especially true when lumped in the same division as Michigan and Harbaugh and Ohio State and Meyer. Michigan State has more than held its own in the division and shows no signs of backing down from the competition. Somewhat lost in the shadows of Michigan’s star-studded signing day festivities and another top-notch class in Columbus, Michigan State did pretty well with its class as well.
Dantonio’s name was floated around to some degree by some as a potential coaching candidate for South Carolina. Following the in-season retirement of Steve Spurrier, Dantonio was seen as an intriguing possibility, being a former South Carolina football player. Dantonio kept himself out of that conversation though and went on to win the Big Ten and play in the playoff this past season. He has built a good thing in East Lansing, and now the Spartans are rewarding him for it.