It’s quickly becoming buyout season in college football. Since Week 1, it’s felt like college coaches have been dropping like flies, with more set to get fired in the coming days. Luke Fickell is on the shortlist of the next coach to receive a fat check to go away after Florida finally, mercifully fired Billy Napier on Sunday.
But you likely already know which coaches are on the chopping block right now. Let's look ahead a little bit and see which other ones are headed toward unemployment after a rough start to the season. Buyouts are creeping upwards of $50 million for the top coaches, yet poor performance and the sport's new economic landscape means even that might not save your job. And that should have some very big names with some very underwhelming results on notice.
Lincoln Riley, USC Trojans
Buyout: $80 million
USC was handed its second loss of the season on Saturday night, falling to Notre Dame 34-24, and once again the spotlight is on Lincoln Riley. He hasn’t really turned USC into the powerhouse Trojans fans expected after his success at Oklahoma; instead, the Trojans get pushed around repeatedly by the heavyweights of the sport. This season is trending toward another disappointment, and it makes you wonder if the administration in L.A. would be interested in making a move.
According to recent reports, Riley’s buyout is around $80 million, which is one of the most expensive among currently employed coaches. For now, he’s safe, especially since things haven't totally bottomed out on the field. But it’s not something that’s out of the question — after all, they brought Riley in to win, and the Trojans haven’t even sniffed the College Football Playoff yet and are trending in the wrong direction this year.
Since his first season in 2022, the Trojans haven’t won more than eight games and haven’t been particularly competitive in conference play. At some point, the Trojans will stop accepting mediocrity and come to the same realization Penn State did. And that means not even Riley's massive buyout could keep USC from moving on.
Mike Norvell
Buyout: $54.4 million
Mike Norvell almost fooled us. He started the year 3-0, including a win over Alabama, and climbed as high as No. 8 in the AP poll. But that seems like forever ago, back when Florida State hadn’t lost yet. Now, they’ve dropped their last four games, and the same nightmares from last season are resurfacing. Norvell might have avoided getting fired after 2024's debacle, but he won’t be fortunate enough to survive again if things don’t change quickly.
Only two of Florida State's losses this year have come against ranked teams, and falling to this Stanford team is an unforgivable sin. Over the last two seasons, Norvell is 1-11 in conference play. They’ve lost nine straight conference games. Considering how bad the ACC is, that isn’t good at all.
I know the Seminoles have PTSD from paying out Willie Taggart’s buyout, but it’s time to start thinking about how long it would take to raise the money to get rid of Norvell. He is going to continue to run this team into the ground, and if he can’t figure it out this year, he likely never will.
Brian Kelly, LSU Tigers
Buyout: $62 million
Brian Kelly will never end the cycle, no matter where he coaches. This season is once again in shambles after losses to teams the Tigers should be beating. Taking nothing away from Vanderbilt, LSU was the No. 10 team in the country and truthfully, they haven't looked like one of the best teams in college football all year.
They have some massive problems on offense and the longer they linger, the shorter Kelly's leash will get. He’s been to the College Football Playoff once as a coach when he was at Notre Dame and the Fighting Irish were ran out of the stadium. In each of the last two seasons, Kelly and the Tigers have been handed midseason losses that ultimately knocked them out of contention.
The next two weeks LSU has to play Texas A&M and then at Alabama. I have no confidence in Kelly to get two significant conference wins. They already have two losses, which all but knocks them out of contention for an SEC title game appearance. How much longer will the LSU administration accept “so close” before they realize Kelly will never get over the hump?
Dabo Swinney, Clemson Tigers
Buyout: $60 million
It’s time to start having a serious conversation about Dabo Swinney and where he stands with Clemson. This much-hyped season couldn’t be going any worse for the Tigers, and after a loss to SMU, it feels like this could be the end for Swinney at Clemson. After dropping to 1-3, the team did manage to win two straight, but they suffered yet another setback Saturday without starting QB Cade Klubnik. It’s likely the Tigers might not even beat Duke next season.
Swinney would be owed $60 million if he’s fired, but Clemson doesn’t spend frivolously in the transfer portal, so they have every reason to trigger a regime change if this season continues to unravel. At worst, the Tigers should get to bowl eligibility; if they can’t even get there, well, some serious changes are in store.
Bill Belichick, UNC Tar Heels
Buyout: $30 million
Bill Belichick wanted to come to the college ranks to turn UNC into the “33rd NFL team”, but right now they look worse than their FBS counterparts. While there are some parallels, especially these days, running a college football program like a professional one was never going to work out like he thought it was. The Tar Heels are far from competing in the ACC, let alone making the College Football Playoff.
The Belichick experiment is going just about how you’d expect for a coach who's never dealt with 18-year-old kids. It was always going to take time for North Carolina to enter the national conversation, but the Tar Heels could very well be over waiting for that to happen already. The way this season has gone, it’s going to take longer than a year or two for UNC to be competitive in the ACC.
If I’m Bubba Cunningham and the rest of the UNC administration, I’m not waiting around for this grand plan to work. The ACC is the worst Power 4 conference this year, and the fact that UNC can’t be relevant in an irrelevant league now means it’s going to be a long road to dominance. It might be worth paying $30 million to keep from continued regression.