Brent Pry got a pretty good deal when his buddy James Franklin hired him back at Virginia Tech in December, after Tech Athletics had relieved Pry of his head-coaching duties in September, following an 0-3 start to the Hokies’ 2025 season.
Pry was owed a $6 million buyout under the terms of his 2022 contract, for the final two seasons of the deal, in 2026 and 2027, when he had been set to earn $5 million annually.
ICYMI
- Virginia Tech | Brent Pry fired: ‘Results on the field were not acceptable’
- Brent Pry to return to Virginia Tech, reuniting with former boss James Franklin
Per the terms of a renegotiated buyout, Pry is set to get $3.1 million, payable in installments over the next couple of years, and then, on top of that, the term sheet for his new job as defensive coordinator/linebackers coach will pay him $5 million over the next three years – $1.5 million a year for the 2026 and 2027 seasons, and $2 million for the 2028 season.
There’s extra money in there: pro-rated $72,000 for the month of December 2025, and a pro-rated $333,000 for two months at the end of the deal, the months of January and February, 2029.
That’s a really good deal for Pry, who wasn’t going to be in high demand for jobs paying an average of $1.7 million a year after his disastrous run at Tech, which had him compiling a 16-24 record as the head coach, including the 0-3 start to the 2025 season.
If life was fair, he’d get debited with the overall 3-9 finish for the Hokies in 2025, since it was the team that he recruited, and the staff that he put in place, that limped home to that one.
Franklin, at least, gets a guy as his DC/LBs coach that he had on his staff at Vanderbilt and at Penn State, so, there’s familiarity there, which is a plus.
ICYMI
For Whit Babcock, it’s probably a win – with the job offer as a carrot, he was able to whittle down the buyout, so in effect, he gets Pry as the DC/LBs coach for two years for pretty much what he would have owed him anyway.
I hedge that it’s probably a win, because, I mean, again, it’s not like the college football world was beating down the door to get a chance at getting Pry’s services.
This is where the buyout language in the new deal for Pry is worth a look, just in case things don’t work out.
Per the term sheet: “the University will continue to pay your base salary plus supplemental compensation throughout the stated term,” minus an offset for whatever new job he would accept post-termination.
That’s, you know, risky; if Pry doesn’t work out a second time, Babcock is on the hook for an extra $2.3 million, minus whatever Pry could get as a position coach at a Group of 5 or FCS school, which would be his reality at that point.
I can see it as a risk that someone would deem to be worth taking, but then, I mean, they did fire the guy once, and not that long ago.
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Chris Graham
