Panthers owner David Tepper’s signing Matt Rhule to a seven-year, $63 million deal in 2020 was no small gesture. For one, it angered fellow members of the NFL owners’ club, raising the entry price for unproven talent beyond the standard four-year deals they were accustomed to. But, more significantly, it was a gamble on the idea that a roster in need of rebuilding could be rebuilt by someone whose best efforts in that regard came in the NCAA landscape, where talent equity and acquisition are more a game of effort and salesmanship.
The Panthers fired Rhule on Sunday less than three full years into that seven-year contract, and, in many ways, Rhule has changed the coaching landscape irreversibly because of those same considerations Tepper weighed at the time. As we speak, most coaching salaries for first-time head coaches in the NFL have shrunken back to the industry standard (four-year deals worth roughly $4 million per season, give or take), according to sources familiar with the process. And college coaches are once again nonstarters for many considering potential NFL head coaching candidates, according to those same folks. While Urban Meyer had more to do with this than Rhule, the fact that Rhule struggled to transfer the kind of culture-building mechanisms that became synonymous with his rise in college has become reason enough for many to skip the NCAA pool for at least a few more years.
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