The terms of Penn State football coach James Franklin’s recently signed new six-year contract were released on Wednesday morning. The contract extends his tenure with the Nittany Lions’ through at least 2025.
Franklin and Penn State announced that both parties had agreed to an extension back in December.
‘It’s not often a coach gets an opportunity to move back to their home state and coach the team they grew up watching,’ Franklin said in a statement. ‘It’s even more rare that it’s a school as rich in history and tradition as Penn State. It’s been an honor and privilege to be the head coach of the Penn State Football program for the last six years.’
Franklin’s new deal begins with $500,000 in base pay on an annual basis. Supplemental pay makes up for the majority of the annual compensation and increases on an annual basis for a total guaranteed pay of the following. [Under his previous deal Franklin was slated to earn $5.65 million for the 2020 season]
- 2020: $5.4 million
- 2021: $5.5 million
- 2022: $5.75 million
- 2023: $6 million
- 2024: $6.25 million
- 2025: $6.5 million.
Franklin also receives a retention bonus of $300,000 on Dec. 31, 2020 and $500,000 on the same date of the following years for the remainder of the contract. That is a slight increase from his current deal which was paying him $300,000 on average until the final two years of his deal. Under a general assumption that Franklin is still employed by the date of payment, he will exceed the $6 million mark in 2021.
In addition, Franklin saw a rate increase for his annual buyout as well. Under his most recent deal Franklin was set to pay $1 million to the university if he voluntarily terminated his contract. According to his newest terms, that figure has increased to $5 million and decreases by a million over the course of each season, reaching zero in 2025, the final year of his deal. Franklin has yet to coach under the terms of his final year of either of his two previous deals.
The contract also calls for an annual of $1 million in life insurance. A Penn State spokesperson said that ‘Loans for life insurance policies have become more commonplace in coaching contracts.’
Franklin’s various bonuses remain unchanged.
The full terms sheet can be read here.
Franklin, now on his third contract while at Penn State, originally signed a six-year contract in 2014 that would reach a final base pay of $4.5 million in the sixth year of the deal, increasing $100,000 each year from his $4 million base pay during his first year in State College. Franklin’s buyout at the time was $5 million the first two years before eventually decreasing to $1 million for the 2018 and 2019 seasons.
Following a Big Ten Championship campaign and a Rose Bowl appearance in 2016-17, Franklin inked a second deal announced in August of 2017 that gradually increased his base pay from $4.3 million to a base figure of $5.35 million in 2019. That contract was on track to expire in 2022.
It’s not expected that the university will publicly announce any secondary agreements as it pertains to an increased salary pool for assistant coaches or any additional facility upgrades. Penn State is already underway with a plan budgeted for $70 million to renovation various aspects of the football facilities with other upgrades already underway.
