Nick Saban is no longer the highest-paid coach in college football

Published Nov. 15, 2016 3:20 p.m. ET

Aaron Torres

College football fans received an early Christmas present on Wednesday -- or at the very least, something very interesting to browse during their lunch break -- when USA Today released its annual rankings of the top-paid coaches in college football.

The rankings always create interesting talking points -- who’s underpaid, who’s overpaid and what does it all mean in the grand scheme of things. But this time we got a new talking point altogether: Who is the highest-paid coach in college football?

For years, Nick Saban has been at the top of the list, but things have changed. Jim Harbaugh has taken over the reins at a little over $9 million a year. Nine million!

The number is a bit deceiving, with AL.com providing a bit more context:

Harbaugh's actual salary is "only" $5 million, but he reaches the $9 million plateau due to a pair of life insurance premiums paid by the school. He receives $2 million every December, and received an additional $2 million lump sum in August when the insurance addendum to his contract was approved.

Still, Saban isn’t doing too shabby, coming in at No. 2 with a $6,939,935 salary this season. Oh, and Saban has plenty of other perks, too, including arguably my favorite in college football: Boosters actually paid off the mortgage on Saban’s home!

Man, don’t you just love college football?

But since it's Harbaugh who sits at the top of the payment throne, we have to ask: Who has it better than Jim Harbaugh?