Kirby Smart makes sure Georgia football coaching staff cashing in on 9-0 start

ATHENS —Kirby Smart said he divided the season up into quarters, but he’s making sure his coaching staff gets their dollars along the way.

Offensive coordinator Todd Monken is due $100,000 raises in the second and third year of the contract extension he signed last June, per an Athens Banner-Herald report.

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Monken has looked like a bargain at $2.005 million this season, as his coaching and scheming helped transform a former fourth-string walk-on into the SEC’s No. 2 passer entering Georgia’s game at Mississippi State at 7 p.m. on Saturday night.

The No. 1-ranked Bulldogs can clinch their what would be their fifth trip to the SEC Championship in the past six years with a win in Starkville.

Monken has overseen offenses at Georgia in 2020 and 2021 that have produced the two highest-rated passers in school history in JT Daniels and Stetson Bennett.

Former Florida coach Dan Mullen noted the development of Bennett earlier this season.

“Last year it was always, can they win despite Stetson Bennett?” Mullen said. “(It was) let’s put everything on everybody else and not let him make mistakes.”

Monken re-wired the base scheme from inside runs and heavy play-action with RPO and shot plays, to more of a perimeter attack.

Bennett, coming off one of the best performances of his career in a historic 27-13 win over Tennessee in the battle of No. 1-ranked teams, has been quick to praise “Coach Monk” for his play calls and schemes after most games this season.

Bennett deserves plenty of credit himself, as he improved his mechanics over the offseason and makes good decisions at the line of scrimmage in Monken’s Pro-Style attack.

It has paid off for Bennett as his NIL deals were approaching $1 million after a deal worth around $50,000 with an onion company earlier this season.

Georgia’s defense has also come up big this season, pulling off one of the most impressive reloading jobs after the Bulldogs had eight players selected in the NFL draft, including five first-round picks.

Smart saw to it that defensive backs coach Fran Brown received a one-time payment of $203,597, while Chidera Uzo-Diribe received a payment of $77,399.

Both Brown and Uzo-Diribe — both coaches under two-year contracts — make $775,000 and $455,000 annually.

As for Smart’s “quarters system,” the Bulldogs’ seventh-year head coach said, “we’re really just starting the fourth quarter, (and) they remember what you do in November.”

OC Todd Monken $2 million*

Co-DC Will Muschamp $800,000

Co-DC Glenn Schumann $800,000

RBs Dell McGee $800,000

DL Tray Scott $750,000

DB Fran Brown $750,000

WRs Bryan McClendon $700,000

OL Stacy Searels $650,000

TE Todd Hartley $650,000

OLB Chidera Uzo-Diribe $450,000

*-Monken has $100,000 raises built in payable on July 1, 2023, and July 1, 2024