Thursday, November 29, 2007
Bowling for dollars
Randy King
Randy King's Tech Insider is exclusive to roanoke.com and is posted by 5 p.m. Thursdays in season.
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Editor's note: Randy King is taking the week off. The next installment of Virginia Tech Insider will run on Dec. 13.
College football bettors wagering on the ACC Championship Game between sixth-ranked Virginia Tech and No. 12 Boston College won’t be the only ones with some coin riding on what transpires Saturday at Jacksonville Municipal Stadium.
Tech coach Frank Beamer, his eight assistant coaches, and four other integral members of the Hokies’ staff will have some serious loot on the line, too.
Thanks to lucrative bowl bonus provisions in their contracts with the school, Beamer & Co. stands to collect some pretty strong green if Tech beats BC and locks up the ACC champion’s spot in the Jan. 3 Orange Bowl.
Beamer will have a minimum of $50,000 at stake, depending on the outcome. The Hokies’ head man, who already has earned a $25,000 bonus for his team winning the Coastal Division title and making the game, will make another $25K if Tech wins. A victory will send Tech to the Orange Bowl, which qualifies Beamer for a $75K bonus for guiding his team to a non-championship BCS bowl.
If the Hokies lose Saturday, it will cost Beamer at least $50K -- the $25K bonus for his team winning the league title, plus the $25K difference between his team making a non-championship BCS bowl ($75K) and the secondary prize of $50K he would receive should Tech be relegated to either of the ACC’s next two postseason tie-ins, the Dec. 31 Chick-fil-A Bowl and the Jan. 1 Gator Bowl.
Gator Bowl chairman Rick Catlett told The Roanoke Times’ Mark Berman on Tuesday that the Jacksonville-based bowl is not interested in taking the ACC title game loser. So that leaves the question of whether the Atlanta-based CFA Bowl would take the Hokies for a second straight year or opt to go with No. 16 Clemson (9-3), which like Tech also has a strong fan base that has routinely traveled well to bowls.
If the CFA Bowl goes with more geographically friendly Clemson, the Hokies would be a mortal lock for the Dec. 28 Champs Sports Bowl in Orlando, Fla. That game, however falls under "other bowls" in Beamer’s contract, all of which qualify him for a $25K bonus. If that scenario plays out, Beamer’s bowl bonus take falls from a maximum $125K to $50K.
No matter what happens Saturday, Beamer will still receive a $40K "entertainment fee staff" for his team advancing to a bowl for a 15th consecutive year. Talk about a nice party. Caviar and fine wine and much more, obviously! Plus, the Tech coach is guaranteed of pocketing $17,500 to cover his additional radio-TV responsibilities for a bowl.
No matter what, those are some pretty nice perks for a guy already making more than $2 million annually.
It so convinces me that I’m going to have to talk the Times about my current deal. All I know is I've gone will to 13 straight bowls, and I’ve yet to pocket one dime extra. In fact, I’ve lost money many years, especially those in which the "Clydesdales" were running as strong as Secretariat in the Belmont. Thirty-one lengths? My best margin of aleness was 26 one rambunctious evening at the Gator.
The rest of Tech’s staff won’t have Beamer-like stash at stake. It hardly qualfies as mere chicken feed, however.
Beamer’s pair of coordinators, defensive guru Bud Foster and offensive head Bryan Stinespring, already are guaranteed $5,000 apiece for the club making the league title game. A win Saturday bumps will spike each’s bonus another $2,500.
In regards to which bowl the Hokies land, both coordinators are well protected. If Tech goes to the Orange, each will pocket a $55K cut. Both get $50K should Tech fall to the CFA or Gator. If the Hokies wind up in Orlando, they will have to settle for a mere $45K.
Billy Hite, Tech’s associate head coach and running backs coach, and Hokies outside linebackers coach/recruiting coordinator Jim Cavanaugh are already guaranteed of a $4K bonus for the team making the conference championship game. They each will pocket another $2K for a win Saturday. An Orange Bowl berth would be worth to $30K to each, compared to $25K for a CFA-Gator spot. Their take would dissipate to a measley $20K should Tech be relegated to the Champs Sports. Good thing Hite quit smoking is all I say.
The other five assistants -- Charley Wiles (defensive line), Curt Newsome (offensive line), Mike O’Cain (quarterbacks), Torrian Gray (defensive backs) and Kevin Sherman (wide receivers) -- plus Mike Gentry, Tech’s assistant athletic director for athletics and performance, and John Ballein, the Hokies’ associate director of athletics for football operations, already have earned a $3K bonus for the club making the league title game. That payout jumps to $5K should the Hokies take the rematch with BC.
All seven would receive a $25K bonus should Tech make the Orange. The take drops to $20K for a CFA-Gator spot, and $15K for a Champs Sports bid. Still enough for another boat to run Claytor Lake, henchman.
Veteran equipment manager Lester Karlin and Mike Goforth, Tech’s assistant athletic director for athletic training, also will find something extra in their Christmas stockings. Each made $1,500 for Tech advancing to this week’s title game, a take that will escalate to $2,500 with a Tech win. Each will receive the equivalent of two months’ salary if the Hokies go to the Orange. The equivalent fades to 1.5 months’ salary for a CFA-Gator berth, and one month should Tech fall to Orlando.
The performance-based perks don’t end here, though. The better the bowl, the better for the assistant coaches. Should Tech go to the Orange, the assistants all are guaranteed of an 8-percent raise in salary for next year. The raise drops to 7 percent for a CFA or Gator berth, and 6 percent for a Champs Sports spot.
And what would the deal have been if Tech hadn’t qualified for a bowl? All would have had to settle for a skimpy 5-percent hike. Jeez, you’d have to win a Pulitzer in my business these days to get that kind of jack.
Man, this bowling stuff sure pays well, doesn’t it?
And, to think, I thought I had made a little strike that one year in the ’80s, when I collected $73.30 in points money one season in the old King Pin League. Where was that? Viking Lanes on Franklin Road. It went broke and folded, too.
