K-State athletic director Gene Taylor made a public announcement this week that he is working on contract extensions and raises for head football coach Chris Klieman and head basketball coach Jerome Tang. Based on how their teams performed this past season, they both deserve contract extensions (at the very least) along with raises. It did beg the question of where these two coaches’ salaries rank compared to their peers in the league. So I looked up the salaries of all the football and basketball coaches of the new Big 12 to see where Klieman and Tang compare to the others.

Three of the schools are private and do not disclose the salaries of their coaches, so I was not able to get the salaries for Baylor’s Dave Aranda, TCU’s Sonny Dykes, and BYU’s Kalani Sitake. I was able to get the salaries of the eleven remaining coaches and discerned that Chris Klieman ranks just about smack dab in the middle compared to the other coaches. These annual salary numbers are approximate since they take into account base salary and incentives.

Salaries of Big 12 football coaches:

1.) Oklahoma State – Mike Gundy – 7.5 million

2.) Oklahoma – Brent Venables – 7.25 million

3.) Texas – Steve Sarkisian – 5.45 million

4.) Kansas – Lance Leipold- 5 million

5.) Houston – Dana Holgorsen – 4.3 million

6.) Iowa State – Matt Campbell – 4 million

7.) Kansas State – Chris Klieman – 4 million

8.) Texas Tech – Joey McGuire – 4 million

9.) West Virginia – Neal Brown – 4 million

10.) Cincinnati – Scott Satterfield – 3.5 million

11.) UCF – Gus Malzahn – 2.3 million

Baylor – Dave Aranda – not disclosed

TCU – Sonny Dykes – not disclosed

BYU head coach Kalani Sitake – not disclosed

Klieman is right there in the group with Matt Campbell, Joey McGuire, and Neal Brown. Klieman has done more in the Big 12 than all three of them. Kansas head coach Lance Leipold makes five million dollars a year and has only been in the league a couple of years, and all he has done is make one bowl game with a 6-7 record. If it were up to me, I’d bump Klieman up to at least five million a year and probably 5.1 million to show that K-State is willing to pay more than Kansas. As far as I’m concerned, he has earned it.

Here are the basketball head coach’s approximate salaries

1.) Kansas – Bill Self – 5.725 million

2.) West Virginia – Bob Huggins – 4.15 million

3.) TCU – Jamie Dixon – 3.5 million

4.) Baylor – Scott Drew – 3.350 million

5.) Houston – Kelvin Sampson – 3 million

6.) Oklahoma State – Mike Boynton – 3 million

7.) Texas – Rodney Terry – 3 million

8) Texas Tech – Grant McCasland – 3 million

9.) Oklahoma – Porter Moser – 2.8 million

10.) Iowa State – T.J. Otzelberger – 2.5 million

11.) Cincinnati – Wes Miller – 2.5 million

12.) Kansas State – Jerome Tang – 2.1 million

13.) UCF – Johnny Dawkins – 1.1 million

BYU – Mark Pope -not disclosed

Tang’s current salary ranks near last place in the league. He’s only had one year at the helm, but it was a very successful year, and you don’t want him bolting to another job anytime soon. I’d get him bumped up to the three-million-dollar range, which would be much more in line with the other coaches in the league.

Show Klieman and Tang the money, Gene. To keep the train blaring full speed ahead for these programs, you’ve got to keep these coaches. That means paying them more in line with what they deserve.