There's a trend in college football where coaches give up part of their salary to help their team allocate more resources to NIL. Saturday Blitz's Andrew Boardwine believes Auburn should participate in this trend given Hugh Freeze's lack of leverage after two losing seasons.
"Hugh Freeze’s second season at Auburn has been nothing short of a disaster. The Tigers finished 5-5-7 overall and 2-6 in SEC play, with no bowl game. Freeze’s hire was supposed to bring stability to a program desperate for a turnaround, but instead, Auburn looks lost and uncompetitive," Boardwine wrote.
"While Freeze’s buyout of $20 million is lower than others, it’s still significant for a program that’s already cycled through multiple head coaches in recent years. A contract restructure could give Auburn an option to chart a new course without fully cutting ties.
"Freeze could agree to defer part of his salary or lower his buyout in exchange for more support to rebuild his roster and coaching staff. For Freeze, it’s a chance to prove he’s committed to fixing the mess, and for Auburn, it’s a way to slow the coaching carousel and avoid yet another expensive reset."
Freeze is in no danger of losing his job just yet because of his work on the recruiting trail. He does, however, have less agency to tell his employers "no" about practically anything because of his previous banishment from the SEC. His Ole Miss tenure got him in trouble that he's not doing much to get out of as his Tigers continue to lose and he continues to draw ire for throwing his players under the bus all year.
Freeze's accountability issues would be less of a narrative with a program-first move to give up some salary for the sake of the team's spending. If anything, he owes fans as much going 5-7 with an $11 million roster this past season.
Whether or not he agrees to such an arrangement is unclear. It wouldn't hurt Auburn to at least broach the idea.