Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti's contract will pay him at least $27 million

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – Curt Cignetti’s initial contract at Indiana will pay him at least $27 million, not including bonuses and incentives, across six seasons in Bloomington.

It is also heavily incentivized.

Details of the deal, which IndyStar confirmed via a memorandum of understanding obtained through a records request, include $500,000 in base salary, plus a $250,000 retention bonus paid annually on Nov. 30, beginning in 2024. Cignetti will also make between $3.5 million and $4 million in annual outside marketing and promotional income (OMPI), a blanket term for all non-base and bonus-guaranteed compensation. Cignetti will make $3.5 million across the first year of his deal, with that number rising by $100,000 each year for six years.

Indiana will, as previously reported, handle the buyout connected to Cignetti’s latest contract at James Madison, a figure understood to be around $1.2 million.

The MOU also includes a series of relatively obtainable and lucrative bonuses. If, for example, Cignetti reaches a bowl game, he will not only trigger an automatic one-year contract extension, but he will also receive an extra $250,000 in OMPI — effectively a quarter million-dollar raise — as well. Such an event would also require Indiana to add an extra $500,000 to his pool for the hiring of assistant coaches.

Cignetti’s incentives run deeper, and in particular emphasize competitiveness in an increasingly difficult Big Ten.

That $250,000 increase in OMPI in the event Cignetti leads the Hoosiers to a bowl would become permanently installed into his annual guaranteed compensation. He would also receive a one-time $200,000 bonus for reaching the bowl, and another $50,000 should Indiana win that game.

Indiana hasn’t won a bowl game since 1991.

If Cignetti wins five conference games in a season, he will be entitled to an extra $100,000. That number rises to $150,000 if he wins six league games. Those bonuses are non-cumulative, meaning he would just be paid the highest resulting number.

A top-six Big Ten finish would net Cignetti $250,000, while a second-place finish would add half a million dollars to his total compensation that year.

Winning a Big Ten championship would net Cignetti a $1 million bonus.

College Football Playoff appearances would be even more lucrative. A first-round appearance in the newly expanded 12-team Playoff would carry a $500,000 bonus, while quarterfinal and semifinal appearances would pay $600,000 and $700,000, respectively. Cignetti would be owed $1 million for finishing as CFP runner-up, and $2 million for winning a national championship. Those are also non-cumulative.

The total guaranteed value of the deal, assuming retention bonuses, is $27 million.

The university’s buyout obligation is cleaner than that of Tom Allen, Cignetti’s predecessor.

If Indiana wanted to terminate Cignetti before Dec. 1, 2024, it would own him $20 million. That number falls by $3 million each year thereafter, always on Dec. 1. IU would owe Cignetti that money paid in equal monthly installments across the life of the contract.

Were Cignetti to resign from his position before the end of his contract, he would owe Indiana a continuously decreasing amount of money in the contract’s lifespan:

>> $8 million until Dec. 1, 2024.

>> $6 million the year after.

>> $4 million the year after.

>> $2 million the year after.

>> $1 million the year after.

>> $1 million until the conclusion of the contract, on Nov. 30, 2029.

The reset date for that buyout number is also Dec. 1, annually.

In his last fully reported season at James Madison, Cignetti made $677,311, including bonuses. Before he accepted the Indiana job, JMU offered Cignetti an improved contract that in his words would have been more than enough to live comfortably and retire coaching the Dukes.

Cignetti would also be in line for $50,000 if ever named Big Ten coach of the year, and $100,000 if named national coach of the year. He will also enjoy a variety of standard benefits, including a courtesy car, unlimited family use of the university’s Pfau Golf Course, extensive access to tickets for football and men’s basketball games and “sole ownership  of youth camps (Cignetti) choose(s) to operate, including retention of all net proceeds generated by those camps.” Cignetti would be required to rent any university facilities used in that case.