Gene Smith, Ryan Day contract talks not yet underway at Ohio State

COLUMBUS — Much of the Ohio State coaching pyramid was under construction this offseason.

That didn’t leave much time for the Buckeyes to worry about restructuring the very top of it.

There will be discussions coming down the road for athletic director Gene Smith with coach Ryan Day about his contract and ensuring his salary remains competitive in a shifting landscape both nationally and within the Big Ten. But the first priority for Ohio State was putting the pieces needed to succeed around Day — and without another definitive job offer elsewhere, there was no rush to put together a revamped deal heading into his fourth season with the program.

“I think that time [to discuss the future] was the press conference here and him responding to a question,” Smith said on Wednesday at the Woody Hayes Athletic Center. “At the end of the day, he and Nina are very happy here, his family is happy here. Is there going to be a contract issue down the road? Possibly. He and I haven’t talked about that. We have been 100 percent focused on his current staffing, and we just finished that with the football hires and quite a few changes in our support-staff structure.

“We’ve been focused on the team. There will be a time when he and I will sit down and talk about his contract. But we haven’t done that at this point in time. I’ll let you know when that is done.”

The Buckeyes felt far more pressing needs to complete the staff, and Day had made it clear with both his actions and public comments that he wasn’t looking to leave any time soon.

Multiple sources with direct knowledge of the situation confirmed to Lettermen Row that several teams inquired about Day’s willingness to jump back to the NFL level this offseason after putting together another record-breaking offense with the Buckeyes. But that potentially wasn’t aggressively pursued by Day while he was in the process of hiring new Ohio State defensive coordinator Jim Knowles and three other assistants after missing out on the Big Ten championship for the first time in his head-coaching career.

“He goes out to ’27 [on his contract] — and I’m not sure, I think he might be third in the league [in salary]? I’m not sure, I haven’t even looked at it,” Smith said. “But we’ve always tried to make sure that our top-of-the-pyramid coaches like him are paid consistent with expectations and consistent with performance. So, whenever we get to that, we look at it from that perspective and then we benchmark that by looking at other people in the league and nationally. I haven’t started with that process. I don’t feel the urgency, no. I feel like we need to do it the right way with him and his family and with the university president and the board of trustees. We’ll get to that.

“Historically, I’ve always tried to compensate consistent with expectations and focus. I don’t feel a sense of urgency. It kind of helped me that you guys asked that question and he said he was happy here and not going anywhere. Those rumors were rumors. He and I are very transparent. If somebody offered him a job, he would call me right away. That didn’t happen, so we’re good.”

That stability isn’t likely to change with Ryan Day in place as the capstone for Ohio State.

That doesn’t mean Gene Smith won’t be having a discussion about a new deal to keep it that way — only that a revamped contract will be the last piece of this offseason blueprint.