Cincinnati Basketball: UC “Partner” Under Armour Willing To Pay $1 Million Of Mick Cronin’s Salary At UNLV

As events on the Mick Cronin front continue to unfold, new details about UNLV’s official offer to Mick Cronin have been revealed. Suggested here in the Las Vegas Review-Journal’s Mark Anderson’s article and his interview with ESPN1530’s Mo Egger this afternoon, the school is actually only front a portion of the bill.

"In individual meetings with members of the University of Nevada Board of Regents, UNLV officials have received enough positive feedback that if they were to offer a potential coach at least $2 million per year, it would be approved by the state’s governing body. The Under Armour part of a potential deal was not believed to be part of such discussions with regents."

And this.

"If the deal is indeed in the $3 million-per-year range, the other roughly $2 million would be split between UNLV and outside sources. Even if the school’s commitment was $700,000 to $1 million, it would not be a for-sure sale to the regents, though the belief by UNLV officials in discussions with several sources that included regents, the votes probably will be there."

That’s right, UNLV wants Mick Cronin so bad that the state’s Board of Regents is allowing two-thirds of his potential $3 million salary to come from outside of the school’s budget. A full one-third is coming from the somewhat unreliable and frequently fickle sources of donors. How insane is that? No wonder Mick is out there visiting them right now.

You can take it to the bank, and he just might, that he’s feeling all kinds of love at UNLV right now that UC hasn’t shown him recently.

Even more interesting is the fact that Under Armour, with whom Cincinnati signed a 10 year, $47 million merchandising deal last Summer, will fill the remainder of Mick’s $3 million annual salary. That has to strike you as odd. Not nine months ago we were signing the praises of the partnership UC struck with the apparel giant. Now they’re actively working to rip Mick away from us.

UPDATE: Now it’s gotten even more bizarre. UNLV is currently under contract with Nike through the 2018-19 season. How Under Armour is skirting that deal to pay a portion of Mick’s contract and not have the school be in breach of their arrangement with Nike I’ll never understand.

I get that this sort of thing probably happens all the time and with the way UA has made itself a national brand in college athletics, it could have happened with any one of Cincinnati’s coaches. If, say, Auburn’s athletic director has a case of amnesia and rehired Tommy Tuberville, I’m sure Under Armour would help the Tigers with his salary considering they are an active partner. But it does seem underhanded considering Mick’s long history with the Bearcats and how the apparel giant’s contribution to his potential UNLV salary is so large.

Either way, the money appears to be in front of him at this time. Will he take it? Well that all depends on Mike Bohn and Santa Ono’s commitment to improving the basketball facilities, increasing the program’s budget, and once and for all providing Mick Cronin with a private plane. You know, like all of the basketball programs Cincinnati prides itself on being.