Grantham signs as highest-paid assistant
New defensive coordinator gets $4.4 million deal
The Florida Gators are betting big Todd Grantham will revive the team’s defense a season after the unit slipped badly.
The team’s new defensive coordinator signed a three-year, $4.47 million deal, making him the highest-paid assistant coach in UF history.
Grantham is scheduled to earn $1.39 million this season, $1.49 million in 2019 and $1.59 million in 2020, according to the contract released Tuesday by UF in response to a public records request. Based on 2017 salaries, Grantham would be among the nation’s 10 highest-paid assistant coaches.
Grantham, the only Gators’ assistant to ink a three-year deal, joined new coach Dan Mullen at Mississippi State and immediately turned around the Bulldogs’ D.
During Grantham’s one season in Starkville, the Bulldogs ranked third in the 14-team SEC in total defense and fifth in scoring defense after finishing 12th in total defense and 13th in scoring defense in 2016.
The 2017 Gators, on the other hand, ranked outside the nation’s top-15 defenses for the first time since 2007 and ended the season in disarray. Florida yielded 87 points during back-to-back losses to Georgia and Missouri and allowed 38 points to struggling Florida State.
Grantham arrives with a wealth of of both NFL and SEC coaching experience, including four seasons at Georgia (2010-13). He also was on Nick Saban’s defensive staff during the 1990s at Michigan State.
Based on Grantham’s UF deal, the school is aware he’s a hot commodity. While other assistants have buyout clauses, the 51-year-old will not have to pay the school if he is hired as a Division I head coach or by an NFL team.
Meanwhile, UF co-offensive coordinators Billy Gonzales and John Hevesy will be compensated more modestly. One reason, perhaps, is Mullen will call plays and have a heavy input into offensive game-planning.
Gonzales and Hevesy, who also were co-coordinators under Mullen at Mississippi State, each is scheduled to earn $565,000 this season and $590,000 in 2019. The duo also has worked with Mullen dating to 2001 at Bowling Green and later at Utah and UF.
Mullen’s 10 assistants will earn $4.74 million this season, but $5.44 million in 2019.
The rest of Mullen’s coaching staff will be compensated as follows:
Veteran defensive line coach Sal Sunseri signed a two-deal deal worth $565,000 annually, making him the highest-paid coach on Mullen’s staff who is not a coordinator.
Sunseri coached 10 seasons in the NFL, including the past three coaching defensive line with the Oakland Raiders, and five seasons in the SEC, including four under Nick Saban at LSU (2000) and Alabama (2009-11).
Quarterbacks coach Brian Johnson will earn $415,000 this season and $440,000 in 2019. A former player under Mullen in 2004 at Utah, Johnson, 31, served as Houston’s offensive coordinator last season following three seasons coaching QBs under Mullen at Mississippi State.
Running backs coach Greg Knox inked a two-year deal worth $440,000 annually. Knox, who also will oversee special teams, served at the interim head coach at Mississippi State during the team’s bowl game after Mullen’s Nov. 26 hiring by UF.
Knox has more than 20 years of combined SEC coaching experience at Ole Miss, Auburn, and Mississippi State.
Safeties coach Ron English, a former head coach at Eastern Michigan, signed a two-year deal worth $340,000 annually.
Mullen re-joins Mullen after one season at Mississippi State.
English was out of coaching for three years before joining San Jose State as its defensive coordinator in 2016. Eastern Michigan dismissed English in 2013 after five seasons for using inappropriate language, including a homophobic slur, during a video session with the team’s secondary earlier that season.
Cornerbacks coach Charlton Warren will earn $190,000 this season, but will receive a raise to $390,000 in 2019 since his former school still owes him money.
Despite their collapse in 2017, leading to coach Butch Jones’ firing, the Vols allowed the secondfewest passing yards per game (161.7) among 14 SEC team last season.
Also coming from Tennessee, tight ends coach Larry Scott will earn just $190,000 this season, but will receive a raise to $415,000 since, like Warren, the school still owes Scott money.
Scott served one season as Tennessee’s offensive coordinator, but has deep roots to the state of Florida.
A native of Sebring, Scott attended USF and played offensive line there. He coached with the Bulls (2006-12) and Miami (2013-15).
Linebackers coach Christian Robinson will earned $80,000 annually over two seasons. Robinson, who arrived in January as a 27-year-old, was a graduate assistant last season at Mississippi State and played linebacker under Grantham at Georgia.
Each deal also includes a $10,000 annual “equipment supplement” from Nike, a $1,500 “academic incentive” and the use of a courtesy car from a Gainesville dealership.
Two coaches, Grantham and Gonzales, opted for a $6,000 car stipend, rather than use a courtesy car.
UF also released the contract of strength and conditioning coach Nick Savage, who inked a oneyear, $250,000 deal.