Mike Bianchi: If FSU brings back Jimbo Fisher, he needs to work for cheap

Hire Jimbo Fisher.

For $1 million a year.

Go ahead and laugh and call me crazy. Tell me college football doesn’t work that way anymore.

My response: Maybe that’s exactly the problem.

First things first: The best possible outcome for Florida State is that Norvell starts winning football games, saves his job and saves FSU from writing one of the most painful checks in college football history. His contract runs through 2031 and calls for FSU to pay 85% of his remaining compensation if he’s fired without cause. At this point, we’re talking about a potential buyout in the neighborhood of $50 million.

For a program already swimming in debt, that’s not a buyout. That’s a financial root canal.

But if Norvell can’t turn this thing around and Florida State decides it has no choice but to make a change, please don’t do what desperate college athletic departments always do.

Don’t immediately hand the next coach another seven- or eight-year contract worth $8 million, $9 million or $10 million annually because “that’s the market.”

Forget the market.

Call Jimbo and offer him $1 million a year.

Seriously.

“Jimbo, you’re 60 years old and no other big-time programs are knocking down your door to hire you,” FSU president Richard McCullough should say. “We’d love to bring you back. You know the place. You’ve won a national championship here. You know how to recruit here. You know what Florida State can be. But here’s the deal: We’re broke, you’re rich and neither one of us needs to pretend otherwise.”

Fisher received the mother of all golden parachutes when Texas A&M fired him in 2023 — more than $76 million remaining on a contract that continues paying him through 2031.

In other words, Jimbo doesn’t need Florida State’s money.

Florida State needs Florida State’s money.

It’s the perfect solution: Jimbo gets another big-time job he probably wouldn’t get otherwise and FSU gets a big-time coach at a bargain-basement price.

Even if I say so myself, this is genius. Give Jimbo a three-year deal at $1 million annually and load it with incentives. Win the conference? Here’s a big bonus. Make the College Football Playoff? Here’s another. Win the national championship? Back up the Brinks truck.

And if, after three years, Fisher has resurrected Florida State football, then sit down and negotiate a conventional contract.

Imagine that concept.

A coach earning the gigantic contract before actually receiving the gigantic contract.

What a revolutionary idea!

There’s also delicious irony in Fisher returning to the place he left nearly a decade ago. Remember one of the major sources of friction before he bolted for Texas A&M? Fisher kept pushing Florida State to invest more heavily in football. He wanted better facilities, more infrastructure, more resources and more commitment.

FSU people got tired of hearing Jimbo demand more, more, more.

Then Fisher left.

And guess what Florida State eventually did?

It started spending more, more, more.

The Seminoles opened a massive new football center in 2025, part of an extraordinary facilities arms race that has transformed college football. The school has also poured money into Doak Campbell Stadium and other athletics projects. FSU reported hundreds of millions of dollars in athletics-related debt in fiscal 2025, with officials saying much of the increase was tied to revenue bonds for the stadium renovation and football operations center.

Jimbo’s delivery could be exhausting. His demands could be relentless. His departure was ugly.

But he was not wrong about where college football was headed. He saw the SEC money machine accelerating and understood Florida State was going to have to spend aggressively to keep up.

FSU eventually came around to his way of thinking. Unfortunately, the Seminoles took the scenic route. And now, after all that spending, they could potentially find themselves owing Norvell somewhere around $50 million just to go away.

Which brings us back to the insanity of coaching contracts.

Why must Florida State pay its next coach $8 million or $10 million annually? Because Alabama, Georgia and Texas do?

That’s not economics. That’s ego.

College athletic departments have spent years convincing themselves that the size of the coach’s paycheck is somehow evidence of the quality of the program. Florida did it with Billy Napier. The Gators hired him in 2021 with a seven-year, $51.8 million contract — starting at $7.1 million per year and escalating from there.

Why?

Because that’s what big-boy programs do.

And then they fire the coach and discover what big-boy buyouts cost.

Florida eventually fired Napier and owed him nearly $21 million.

At some point, shouldn’t somebody try something different?

Jimbo Fisher gives Florida State that opportunity precisely because he’s already wealthy beyond comprehension. Texas A&M is still scheduled to pay him millions annually through 2031, and there’s no contractual offset requiring those payments to shrink if he takes another coaching job.

So if Jimbo truly wants to coach again — and there has been recent reporting that he’s interested in returning to Florida State — then let’s find out how badly he wants it.

Does he want to coach a big-time program? Or does he just want another big-time contract?

Offer him the chance to come home, repair his reputation and finish what he started.

For $1 million dollars a year — and not a penny more.

And take the $7 million or $8 million annually that would normally disappear into the head coach’s bank account and pour it into the program — player acquisition, retention, recruiting, personnel, support staff, analytics and everything else required to compete in modern college football.

Jimbo once complained that Florida State wasn’t investing enough in football.

Fine.

Then bring him back and take his advice.

Spend the money on football.

Just don’t spend it on Jimbo.

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