Floyds Payday

High school sports have turned into big business, especially so in the South.

A report published in December 2012 by CNBC editor Mark Koba said the national average salary for a high school football coach is around $39,000.

But in football-loving Texas, that average is more than $88,000, and one coach at Euless Trinity High School made more than $114,000 in 2011.

Barry Lunney at Bentonville High School is widely believed to be the highest-paid coach in Arkansas, with a reported salary of $101,068.

How about in Alabama? Why there, you ask? Because that is where Josh Floyd now coaches. Floyd, you may remember, resigned from Springdale private school Shiloh Christian in May to accept a job offer at Hewitt-Trussville, a Birmingham-area public school that plays in the state’s largest classification and has averaged 6.5 wins per season the last 12 years.

A job offer, as it turns out, that pays a salary of $120,000 — which makes Josh Floyd the highest-paid high school football coach in Alabama.

The website al.com reports Floyd’s salary breakdown like this: $47,196 for teaching, $32,000 as as head football coach and $40,804 as assistant athletic director for football programs.

Floyd was the head coach at Shiloh Christian for 10 years, winning four state titles in a five-year span and compiling a 99-29-1 record.

He was a national record-setting quarterback of the school’s football team in the late ’90s. And you may have heard of his father, Ronnie Floyd, the pastor of megachurch Cross Church, which launched Shiloh Christian in 1976.

Oh, and not only did Hewitt-Trussville shell out for Floyd, the school is opening a new 8,000-seat stadium this season. Price tag? About $15 million.

Like we said — big business.