Wren Baker was asked about it and really outlined the importance of them when trying to secure high level candidates.
"It's all relative to who your target is and you have to be competitive. So those agents when you get ready to talk to them about what you’re going to pay they’re going to show you all the salaries in your league, how much of it is guaranteed, what the incentive packages are and they’re going to say do you really want to send a message you’re not as committed as school x?
There’s a back and forth of that. I think we’ve done a really good job here of when we’ve hired people of being fair and understanding what their perspective is, what the institution’s perspective is. People say well I wouldn’t guarantee x, well then you won’t get a very good candidate pool because other people in the market place. We know there’s three other jobs that look pretty similar to ours, if you want to wait until they’re done and take what’s left I guess you could have that strategy.
But the other thing it does if you bring somebody in and they have a lot of success it puts you so far behind in the next deal and they remember. It’s just a little bit of trust, little bit of trying to do the right thing and a little bit of what the market is dictating.
I know people feel different ways about the extension we gave Neal. I thought it was a very fair deal. He won nine games, we had a good year, we had a lot of young people coming back. It didn’t change the total amount owed to him very much and it distributed it differently. Because we went from 100-percent guaranteed to 75-percent it reduced this year’s commitment by $1 million. It’s not the big number you’re worried about, it’s how you’re paying that out. His is going out over four fiscal years because we change fiscal years in July, so you spread that out a little bit and there was some methodology to that. Cash today is worth more than cash four years from now.
There are no surefire things in athletics. There are no guarantees, you just make the best decision you can with the best information you can."
"It's all relative to who your target is and you have to be competitive. So those agents when you get ready to talk to them about what you’re going to pay they’re going to show you all the salaries in your league, how much of it is guaranteed, what the incentive packages are and they’re going to say do you really want to send a message you’re not as committed as school x?
There’s a back and forth of that. I think we’ve done a really good job here of when we’ve hired people of being fair and understanding what their perspective is, what the institution’s perspective is. People say well I wouldn’t guarantee x, well then you won’t get a very good candidate pool because other people in the market place. We know there’s three other jobs that look pretty similar to ours, if you want to wait until they’re done and take what’s left I guess you could have that strategy.
But the other thing it does if you bring somebody in and they have a lot of success it puts you so far behind in the next deal and they remember. It’s just a little bit of trust, little bit of trying to do the right thing and a little bit of what the market is dictating.
I know people feel different ways about the extension we gave Neal. I thought it was a very fair deal. He won nine games, we had a good year, we had a lot of young people coming back. It didn’t change the total amount owed to him very much and it distributed it differently. Because we went from 100-percent guaranteed to 75-percent it reduced this year’s commitment by $1 million. It’s not the big number you’re worried about, it’s how you’re paying that out. His is going out over four fiscal years because we change fiscal years in July, so you spread that out a little bit and there was some methodology to that. Cash today is worth more than cash four years from now.
There are no surefire things in athletics. There are no guarantees, you just make the best decision you can with the best information you can."
