The document, provided by the university late Friday afternoon April 25 in response to a request from USA TODAY Sports, showed that slightly more than $8 million of Cristobal’s total was categorized as base compensation and $150,000 as bonus and incentive compensation.
This provides the first plain look at Cristobal’s pay as Miami’s coach. The school’s return last year, which covered 2022 calendar-year pay, included amounts connected to the $9 million buyout that Cristobal owed to Oregon for ending his contract with that school. Miami treated that amount as taxable income for Cristobal, but it also paid those taxes. That resulted in Miami reporting Cristobal with $22.7 million in total compensation.
Of that amount, a little less than $7.8 million represented as Cristobal’s basic pay for 2022, Miami athletics director Dan Radakovich confirmed in an interview with USA TODAY Sports last April.
Cristobal’s $8 million in base compensation for the 2023 calendar year likely would have made him the 14th-highest paid football coach in the nation, according to USA TODAY’s annual pay survey for the 2023 season.
For the 2025 season, there are likely 10 football coaches currently set to make at least $10 million in basic annual pay. However, comparing the pay of private-school coaches to that of public-school coaches is difficult because the contracs of private-school employees are not subject to public-records disclosure requirements.
Under IRS rules, while non-profit organizations — including college and universities — make most financial disclosures on a fiscal-year basis, they are required to report employee compensation figures on a calendar-year basis, including the value of all bonuses and benefits. They must use the calendar year completed during the given fiscal year. Miami’s fiscal year covered by the new return ended May 31, 2024, so the 2023 calendar year is used for compensation reporting. A combination of IRS reporting deadlines and the availability of automatic extensions results in a significant time lag in the disclosure of private schools’ pay numbers.
Miami’s new return also showed the 2023 pay for Radakovich and former Hurricanes men’s basketball coach Jim Larranaga.
Radakovich was credited with more than $2.4 million in total pay, including just under $2 million in what the school categorized as base compensation, nearly $287,000 in bonus compensation and an unspecified tax gross-up payment. His base amount for 2023 is nearly identical to the one reported for him for 2022.
Radakovich’s pay likely makes him one of the 10 to 15 highest-paid athletic directors in the nation, according to contracts and tax records obtained by USA TODAY Sports.
Larranaga was credited with just over $3.6 million in total pay, including nearly $3.2 million in base compensation and $250,000 in bonus pay. He resigned as Miami’s coach in late December 2024.