Was Gillispie's settlement 'shameful'?
Posted: Wednesday, October 14, 2009 12:46 PM
Filed Under:
Coaches
Billy Gillispie finally settled his wrongful-termination lawsuit with the University of Kentucky. It should be a nice sense of relief, right? A potentially messy situation is resolved, which lets the ex-Wildcats coach focus on his current off-court issues and the school gets to turn its eye to a promising basketball season.
Except when it comes to the amount of money Gillispie will receive – nearly $3 million.
James Crisp/AP |
Billy Gillispie
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The details of the contract were part of the problem. Gillispie never officially signed his contract, which would’ve paid him $1.5 million for the next four years. He says he was working under a “memorandum of understanding” and that the school knew, and committed fraud by firing him.
Kentucky, for its part, just wanted the thing to go away. The hoops program is profitable enough to pay Gillispie and hire John Calipari, who’s going to get about $31 million over the next 8 years.
But that money irks some people. Even those who aren’t involved in the program or live in the state.
From the Kansas City Star, Yael T. Abouhalkah calls the settlement a shameful payday. Abouhalkah has no patience for Gillispie, his method of recovering money he thought he was owed, or the money college sports coaches receive.
Even though he never signed a contract with the university, and worked under a memorandum of understanding, Gillispie claimed he was owed up to $6 million.
This week, the university announced it had settled for $3 million.
What a shameful amount of money for Gillispie to receive. And what a shameful amount for the university to give up for a basketball coach.
Shameful seems a bit strong. Not when we live in a country with trillion-dollar bailouts and billion-dollar bonuses to financial firms. The school has the money, so what's the big deal?
Maybe I'm not cynical enough or just resigned to the world of college sports today. Good thing there are guys like Abouhalkah out there.
Abouhalkah’s been down this road before. He didn’t think Kansas should overpay Bill Self in 2008 (he eventually received a 10-year, $30 million contract), that the Tigers let down Detroit by blowing their chance to win the AL Central and that Serena Williams’ outburst at the U.S. Open ruined her chances to win.
In short, sports are expensive and jerks will break your heart. Turns out everyone’s a critic.
