Nick Saban still has substantial edge over Kirby Smart, others as college football’s highest-paid coach

Amid rumors that the era of Alabama head coach Nick Saban is coming to a close, Saban still dominates in one off-field category: college football coaches' salaries.

In a list released by USA Today, Saban tops all other public school football coaches as the highest-paid coach in the nation. He's raking in roughly $11 million in salary alone this year, the byproduct of the eight-year contract he signed in August of 2022.

The 70-year-old football coach beat out Clemson's Dabo Swinney and Georgia's Kirby Smart by several hundred thousand dollars and has gotten quite the pay raise since taking over Alabama in 2007 with a then-$4 million salary.

Six national championships and eight SEC titles later, Saban remains the highest-paid coach despite the recent successes of Smart and others.

Alabama's Nick Saban is college football's highest-paid coach in 2023

If Alabama is paying Saban for player development, he's doing a fantastic job. Saban has cultivated the likes of Mark Ingram, Derrick Henry, DeVonta Smith, and many others who have gone on to enjoy unbridled success in the NFL. Seeing his name top the list of highest-paid college football coaches doesn't come as a huge surprise.

If anything, it lights a small fire under Kirby Smart to keep winning national championships. In recent history, Smart's Bulldogs hold the edge with two national titles to their name in 2021 and 2022. They went undefeated last season and could replicate that success this year; they're currently 5-0 coming off a narrow win over Auburn.

Over in Tuscaloosa, Saban's No. 12 ranked Crimson Tide is set to travel to Texas and play the Aggies this weekend, who share Alabama's 4-1 overall record and 2-0 SEC record.

Throughout the last two decades, Saban has proved he's worth the money having cemented a winning culture at Alabama. Maybe this year is the year a few cracks start to show in his program. Time will tell whether Saban will still be worth all that money when his contract is up in 2030.