Boise State's Chris Petersen Signs New Five-Year Contract Worth $2 Million Per Year

by Jeremy Mauss on Jan 3, 2012 8:37 PM PST in Boise State Football

Boise State's Chris Petersen is getting paid!

Petersen is being rewarded with a new five-year contract worth at least $2 million per season. In 2012 Petersen made $1.625 million and his last contract gave him a $100,000 bump in salary per year and an extra year added on to his deal when Boise State won eight wins in a season.

The $2 million per year salary puts Petersen in the top-third of all FBS coaches and will make him the highest paid non-AQ coach, well that is until Boise State goes to the Big East in 2013.

Petersen was offered $4 million by UCLA, but he said no to them. Just for fun, I looked at a cost of living calculator and the $2 million Petersen will make living in Boise translates to needing $2.83 million living in Los Angeles. So, even with the extra expenses living in Los Angeles the $4 million per year deal would be a signifiant raise. However, coaching a bad team that lacks heart and skips out on practices brings down the value that UCLA job quite a bit.

The raise is well deserved and is a huge increase from his first contract in 2006 when Petersen made $500,000 per year when he took over for Dan Hawkins.

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That's good use of the Big East money

by Smoove V on Jan 3, 2012 9:00 PM PST reply actions

Sounds like a lot

but that moves him up to TCU’s Gary Patterson’s level in pay, and AF’s Troy Calhoun 2,200,000+ a year. There is a price to pay for success and when you consider what the most successful schools pay their coaches. And that is especially so in a BCS conference. Most if not all of that money comes from non-school sources such as boosters and money generated by the athletic department.

Teamwork is what the Green Bay Packers were all about. They didn't do it for individual glory. They did it because they loved one another.---Vince Lombardi

by bluesyourdaddy on Jan 4, 2012 7:27 AM PST reply actions

I still say UCLA never offered $4M

Just rumors to that effect from UCLA sources who have a vested interest in not looking cheap anymore. Funny they didn’t offer any other of their targets big dollars and signed a coach for much, much less. Not saying Petersen isn’t worth $4M, he is, just that I doubt UCLA offered that much.

by ev on Jan 4, 2012 8:51 AM PST reply actions

Good points

UCLA pays coaches low, however with the new Pac-12 deal that kicks in next year getting over $20 million per year it is plausible they offered that amount.

I was surprised when that number came out.

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by Jeremy Mauss on Jan 4, 2012 10:16 AM PST up reply actions

From LA Times

They stated:

UCLA pushed hard, people familiar with the talks said, putting together a package that would have paid Petersen nearly $4 million per season and provided more than $2 million annually for assistant coaches.

I would believe the LA Times has a few insiders that leak information to them. BUT, I agree that it probably wasn’t $4M exactly. Almost sounds like it was a rounded number, so maybe more like $3.8M and it also doesn’t address how much of that is incentives. You know how these things work (i.e., $3M base salary, $500k if they reach bowl, another $500k if they reach BCS Bowl, etc.). Hence the reason why they say “package”, so agreed, probably not a straight up $4M.

by TDown on Jan 4, 2012 10:07 PM PST up reply actions