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Mike Leach ranked as most overpaid coach in college football

Not the best list to be No. 1 on.

Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports

Mike Leach is entering his fourth season at Washington State with the first three being a mix of up and down. His tenure got off to a slow start before a bounce back bowl appearance in Year 2. That was followed by another down season. It all adds up to 12 wins in three years. That lack of success and Leach's standing in the upper half of the Pac-12 in salaries led to him topping a recent list of the most overpaid college football coaches.

Tom Fornelli of CBS Sports ranked Leach No. 1. That isn't because he doesn't think Leach is a good coach, but instead his top five is shaped heavily by price per wins, a stat Leach doesn't rank very well having made more than $7 million with just 12 wins to show for it. Here is a bit of what Fornelli had to say in his reasoning:

Now, things looked to be headed in the right direction, as Wazzu followed up a 3-9 season in Leach's first season with six wins in 2013. But then the Cougars went 3-9 again last season. So in his three seasons at Washington State, Leach has made $7,250,000 for 12 total wins, or $604,166.67 per win. That's just not what Washington State was looking for when it hired him.

That number rose this past season when Leach got a raise to $2.75 million but the Cougars still only mustered three wins. Getting off that list will be a challenge going forward, however, not an impossible one. If WSU can just repeat the success of 2013 and sit on six wins a season, Leach would be a relative bargain at just $458,000 per win.

Is Mike Leach the most overpaid CFB coach or does the state of the program he took over give him a pass on the pure cost per win numbers?

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