Trev Alberts on shrinking coaching contract lengths: 'That's gonna require a level of discipline'

The Texas A&M Aggies’ new athletic director, Trev Alberts, is working diligently to reshape the face of other universities’ athletic departments. However, courtesy of the previous regime, he still has to work through some financial logistics.

When addressing the issues Texas A&M has dealt with in the past, Alberts was challenged when answering the question of how he would minimize excess spending. To be precise, would he consider utilizing shorter contracts for the Aggies’ head coaches going forward?

“I think that probably could be part of it too. But look, that’s gonna require a level of discipline that here before, we’ve not done a very good job of,” Alberts said.

“There’s X amount of dollars in the ecosystem; some of it’s being redirected. We essentially have a new expense category of $21.5 million dollars annually that we haven’t had previously… There’s also some inflationary pressures there that will impact it. So this is an entirely new world — tough decisions, tough cuts, (and) things we haven’t done previously are going to have to be contemplated.”

Obviously, the biggest coaching contract issue that comes to mind is that of the previous head coach of the football program, Jimbo Fisher. The Aggies own the record for the largest head coach buyout to date of close to $77 million after letting go of their former headman just before the conclusion of the 2023 season. What made this financial decision a difficult pill to swallow is in 2021, Texas A&M’s then-athletic director, Ross Bjork, would restructure Fisher’s original 10-year $77 million deal, making it into a new 10-year $95 million deal to prevent him from leaving and heading to SEC West rival LSU.

With the lesson of Fisher’s buyout firmly in the minds of the Aggies faithful, Alberts is looking to be careful not to repeat the mistakes of the past. And if that means fewer years when negotiating coaches’ contracts, it appears as if the Texas A&M AD is not above making that change going forward.

Alberts decries ‘dumb expense’ issue in college athletics amid shift to revenue sharing

As Division I college athletics move toward a revenue-sharing model with athletes, athletic departments are reexamining their budgets, searching for margins to create a roster payroll. Alberts is not bemoaning shortcomings in revenue but money seemingly being thrown away.

At SEC spring meetings this week, Alberts shared his perspective: The issue in college sports has not been pulling in enough revenue, but keeping expenses reigned in.

“We’ve just always had enough increasing revenue to overcome dumb expenses,” Alberts said, according to Brandon Marcello. “I’ve said it 100 times, and I’ll say it again: We don’t have a revenue problem in college athletics, we have an expense problem.”