Danny White Receives a Much Deserved Contract Amendment
By Tucker Harlin
The University of Tennessee announced it was amending athletics director Danny White’s contract to make him the highest paid in the SEC Thursday.
Chancellor Donde Plowman has announced a contract extension for athletic director Danny White.
— Tennessee Athletics (@Vol_Sports) August 29, 2024
Under White’s leadership, Tennessee Athletics has seen unprecedented success, culminating in the best overall year in its history in 2023-24.
White’s annual salary jumps to $2.75 million and his contract will still run through July 2030.
Aside from the few nitpicky requests for Thompson-Boling Arena at Food City Center, Tennessee fans have had little to complain about in Banner Dan’s first four years on the job.
His first significant decision as AD was to hire Josh Heupel to run the football program, a decision that has the Vols in the best place they’ve been in well over 15 years.
Away from football, the men’s basketball program is coming off possibly its best season ever and the baseball team just won a national title.
The other coaching change White made in his tenure was replacing Kellie Harper with Kim Caldwell, a young innovative mind that fits the mold of his prototypical head coach.
White has applied his forward thinking ideas along with a respect for tradition to his facility upgrades.
He brought back the VOLS letters to the south side of Neyland Stadium, an idea that brought back good memories from the past for Tennessee fans. “Home of the Vols” will be put back onto the eastern skybox, another element synonymous with the glory days of the program.
We haven’t even gotten to the fact that White’s going to stick a giant entertainment district between Neyland Stadium and the Tennessee River, something that will be the first of its kind in college athletics.
White also understood that Lindsey Nelson Stadium was not built to house a winning baseball program. He introduced a plan to expand and renovate the place in 2023 so it’s fit for the nation champion program it holds, truly bringing Tennessee’s facilities to the same level as the rest of the conference.
I might be missing a few details here and there, but Tennessee needs to do everything it can to keep this man around.
It has never had an AD that’s as innovative as Danny White, and it probably won’t have another one like him anytime soon.
