Whit Babcock’s contract details

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1. I agree with everyone else who feels the football post-season bonuses are out of whack. The AD should not be given a bonus for going to a bowl game. It is so damn easy to get to one these days that it should be expected as part of his normal contract. He should be PENALIZED if our football team doesn’t make it to a bowl game. Heck, to make it even better, whatever he is penalized should go into a scholarship fund. Then, going to one of the playoff games should be higher as he is only going to get ~$80k if we get there next year (FAT CHANCE). I think that should be much higher, given that (next year at least) we’ll be only one of 4 teams in the nation to do that. I’d say bump that to somewhere closer to half his annual base salary (not including his incentive to stay money). Then, for the NC trophy, he should get a full years salary. I’m sure that a playoff or NC appearance/win would start bringing back enough donation money to help make that happen!

   1. Ask UVA how easy it is to get to a bowl game!

2. I’ll personally pay him $1.5 million if we reach the sweet 16 this year.

3. Bizarre incentives. I would up the academic incentives and the national championship incentives for football and basketball–I’d make the incentives so high (like 2 years of salary) for a football or men’s basketball national championship that it would almost certainly create some movement.

   1. And turn your back to cheating? No thanks. I would have given him the Olympic sports bonuses for final 4. After that, its gravy.

      1. How do you get from “increase the incentive” to that’s “turn[ing] back to cheating”?

         1. A stretch? Maybe. But ridiculously high (?) or perhaps better said, very high incentives tied solely to winning perhaps make people do things they wouldn’t do. And perhaps he was offered high incentives and lower base and negotiated for more current income.

            1. To fix things like that all you need to do is have dis-incentives (I know that’s not a real word) for cheating scandals. If Babcock is found as being involved in any scandal, then everything but base salary must be paid back to VT, plus interest.

   2. so about $60k bonus for going to a bowl game vs $15k for making the NCAA hoops tourney. Oh well, guess we cant spell out his priorities any better than that.

      and yes, why wouldn’t progress and success on the academic side be more rewarded? if VT wants to talk the talk, we should walk the walk, and show it in the compensation package.

4. Kudos to Will Stewart on his great conference question!

   1. Mark Berman sounds like an interesting guy.

5. One thing I never got was the size of national championship bonuses compared to bowl game bonuses either on this agreement or on Beamers. Hell I’d say $5,000 for a bowl game, since every other team in Division I makes one and $500,000 – $1,000,000 for a national championship. The way it’s set up on the contracts now, it looks like an afterthough.

   1. You don’t want to set it up where the incentives might be to turn your back on cheating. I understand it. He may have driven up base salary….current income ……to forgo bonus. No way to know how the negotiations went.

6. How does an annual retention incentive ($140K) work?

   1. If he stays till the end of each year, he gets $140k at the end of each year. If he doesn’t, then he doesn’t.

      1. OK. $610K base salary.

         1. Exactly.

            1. not exactly because he will make his annual salary plus buy out if he leaves before December 31st, he won’t get the retention incentive. Now, could he quit on January 1 and still collect his 140k? you betcha

7. 1&1/2 months salary for making a bowl game – really tough to do and more than double for winning a basketball championship?

   1. Hiring a basketball coach that can win a championship, priceless.

   2. Yeah, those priorities are a bit …. er … interesting.

8. This is a great hire. Now let’s see some increased investment in football. Va Tech has a large alumni and fan base that should be able to compete with the top schools as far as infrastructure. We need more investment in facilities and stadium upgrades to make it to the next level. The Sec is investing heavily as are Clemson and FSU and we need to keep up in the arms race. I think this fan base could easily support a 80,000 seat stadium.

   1. Any future expansion of Lane will wait until other planned upgrades (indoor facility for football) are built and paid for. I’m wagering that a new or rebuilt basketball arena will happen before another 15K seats are added to Lane.

      1. That would be logical. Do you think that whatever replaces Cassell will be built in the same footprint? I was thinking that they might demolish Cassell, turn it into a student parking lot and build the new arena in the student lot beside police headquarters. That’s just me thinking, however. Don’t get me wrong…I’d love to see Cassell remain our arena. You can’t beat the venue for viewing basketball. EVERY seat feels like it is on the court. That’s a rare, rare thing.

         1. Cassell will not be torn down in the next 20 years. To me the arches of Cassell are as iconic as the War Memorial Pylons. It may be an old building, but it will never look old. Another generation of alumni will have to pass before Cassell is finished.

         2. At most, it should be modified. Bigger seats, eliminate the corner seats……perhaps create a walkway around the court 5 or 6 rows up for students. Suites at top…..maybe. Best diet lines in CBB. Tech foolish to tear down.

   2. Tech needs a smaller stadium….not larger. The stadium was expanded about the time every game was starting to be televised. Fans were committed to season tickets at that point. Now that every game is televised and relatively small size of Tech fan base ( I beg to to differ Tech has a l large fan base). The top of the East stands should be shaved off and if anything…..more suites constructed. Suites generate more $ and reducing stadium to 60k….ish….would create shortage of tickets…and increase liklihood of sell outs. I believe blaming Brian Stinespring for lack of sell outs is…..ridiculous. 2014 is not 2004. Just food for thought.

      1. I disagree with you. Lane stadium is perfect in size the way it is. When the Hokies are doing well, demand for tickets is at a pretty good break-even point between the stadium being full and the 3rd-party prices of tickets not being too high. If they make Lane smaller, and somehow the Hokies get back to the Top 25 stage, then we’d curse whoever thought it was a good idea to take away seats. And more suites? I’ve never in my 14 years at Virginia Tech heard of anyone talk about wanting to watch the game in a suite (on a regular basis at least; rain/cold weather games I could easily see why). Sure, people want to sit in them once, just so they can experience it. Lane has enough suites. As far as generating more money, Babcock needs to revert all the devastating changes Weaver has done to the college football experience in Blacksburg and look for ways to entice people to come tailgate and enjoy the atmosphere instead of sitting at home with their big screen HDTV’s with DVR, personal bathrooms, and as much alcohol & food they can afford. If he can do that, then we’ll go back, more quickly, to selling out every home game instead of seeing our OOC home game attendances creep down to Spring Game levels.

9. $25k for a men’s hoops national championship? That should be $25M. How about if VT wins a men’s basketball national championship on his watch he just gets all the money, now and forever. I would sign off on that.

   1. with the way basketball is going it should be like 50 million bucks!

10. Money aside, one of the best things I heard from Whit, and in regards to fan experience…”hope”.

11. That’s a really unflattering picture of him! He looked much younger and less tired in the video. 🙂

12. Will, do you know how these incentives and bonuses compare to Weaver’s deal and/or the ADs at similar institutions? With the retention bonus and lofty bowl game bonus, Whit can quickly approach 700K per year.

    1. No clue. First time I’ve been handed contract info in such detail (since it’s the first time we’ve been credentialed media at something like this).

       1. I like the question you asked and glad you can be part of the press confress.

          1. conference. I can’t spell. I’m more of a #’s guy.

          2. Thanks.

             Whit follows us on Twitter, ya know. (fist bump)

       2. Will, I gave you some love on the MBB after listening online. Congrats and well done.

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