Nick Saban's Contract: An Ugly Style Translates to Wins, Dollars and Dominance

The SEC is the nation’s most treacherous path. It’s become college football’s ugliest gauntlet, and this isn’t expected to change anytime soon.

To consistently get through a season unscathed, or at least still on your feet, you need someone who can consistently bring in the nation’s premier talent while also being able to maximize this potential for a few hours on Saturdays.

There are a handful of leaders capable of such football sorcery, but none more ruthlessly successful than Nick Saban.

He does it without a smile and without style, and he has embraced the ugliness that has made the conference elite. Ugly is beautiful in this game. Ugly is rare. Ugly is a hard thing to preach and teach and doesn't show up in box scores.

His ugly is light years better than everyone else’s ugly, however, which is why he’s winning games and receiving accolades at an uncomfortable pace.

He already has a statue and the overwhelming support of an entire state (or at least half of it), and he now has a new contract that will pad his pockets a little more for a little longer. Oh, and he almost had an Alabama high school named after him, but this will just have to wait for now. Shucks.

If you’re an Alabama fan, you’re already smiling from ear to ear. You’ve been smiling for a while now, but the grooves in your facial features are now frozen since learning that your football coach turned down other coaching opportunities and instead signed an extension to remain in Tuscaloosa through 2019.

I don’t blame you. I’d be smiling too.

Under his new deal, Nick Saban will make just a shade over $5.3 million in 2012. Each year after that, his salary will increase, and by 2020, the last year of his new deal, Saban will take home close to $6 million.

All in all, he will make $44,983,333.86 if he coaches out his current deal.

If you were wondering just what this translates to in terms of relative wealth, I’m happy to provide some intelligent perspective. With the money remaining on his current contract, Saban could purchase 16,357,575 McRib sandwiches.

That’s an awful lot of incredible trans fats.

If it’s difficult to wrap your mind around a college football coach making $50 million—and for some of you this might be the case—think about this: At this number, Alabama is still getting an absolute steal.

Since taking over at Alabama in 2007, Saban has accumulated an overall record of 55-12. Keep in mind that half of his total losses at the school came in the first season, when Alabama was 7-6 during a transition year.

Since then, his team has gone 48-6 and won two national championships playing in the nation’s toughest conference. In comparison, Mike Shula led Alabama to a 26-23 record in four seasons prior to Saban’s arrival.

Dig a little deeper, and the trend upward in recent years is even more startling. Since the start of the 2009 season, Alabama has lost only four games by a combined 21 points. To put this in perspective, LSU gave up that many points (21) in four quarters in its BCS championship loss to the Tide back in January.

The wins are adding up, as is the hardware, but extending and upping Saban’s contract is also a brilliant business decision.

Saban is more than just the coach of the nation’s most successful football program. He is the current face of the school and the architect of a cash cow—although cash elephant seems more appropriate—that is more profitable than any athletic department in the country.

The Alabama athletic department generated more than $31 million in net income in 2011. In comparison, LSU pulled in $10 million last year, while Tennessee brought in a cool $14,447. Just enough to cover that 1998 Toyota Camry you’ve always wanted.

The combination of success, both financial and on the field, is why Alabama has been the aggressor in locking up its coach long-term.

In all likelihood, Saban will never finish out this current contract. He could retire, or the school could give him yet another bump in pay if Texas were to give Mack Brown yet another raise or he were to reel off another championship or two. Brown and Saban are now neck and neck when it comes to being college football’s highest-paid coach.

We throw around “championship or two” nonchalantly because that’s how it feels of late. This won’t be easy, however. It never is.

It’s just looked incredibly easy since Saban took over and never looked back.

After losing an incredible amount of talent to the NFL this year, Saban will be tasked with one of his toughest jobs yet. Luckily for him, the backups that he has recruited aren’t like most backups. Most teams don’t have 4- and 5-star players waiting for an opportunity.

Still, he’ll have to manage the brutal SEC gauntlet (including a game in Baton Rouge) with players that aren’t stars just yet. This isn’t a rebuilding year for Alabama, because frankly, there’s no such thing, nor does there need to be. It won't be pretty, but then again, it never is.

Winning ugly isn't cheap, especially if you get the right man for the job.