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Today’s Case

EA Sports College Football 25 to pay $600 to every athlete

It’s finally happening.

EA Sports took another step towards releasing their longest-awaited title, College Football 25. The game, set to be released this summer, has opened the opt-in period for players at all 134 FBS programs to have their likeness used in the video game. The compensation will be standardized for players at $600 and a copy of the game (an estimated $70 value).

According to OneTeam Partners (the group who helped facilitate NIL rights for players), the athletes will go through the process of signing a non-exclusive agreement which can be downloaded and reviewed by agents and attorneys. Athletes will be able to enter their tax and payment info, too.

To combat high-profile opt-outs and amplify marketing, EA Sports has reportedly partnered with college football athletes to become game ambassadors, who will receive additional NIL compensation to promote and market the product. This gives EA Sports the leeway for the current and future titles to sweeten the deal for the biggest stars in the game while not opening up free negotiations for every student-athlete in the opt-in phase (now through the end of April).

The game is estimated to include the NIL activations of over 11,000 student-athletes, making this the biggest coordinated NIL deal ever, as well as the largest video game group licensing project.

The Verdict

• A large-scale NIL deal years in the making is finally coming to fruition

  • Very impressive effort by EA, OneTeam Partners, schools and everyone else to ensure athletes are finally earning their long overdue compensation to be in the game.

    • Also, players will earn $600 plus a free game for each year they opt-in, making for a nice payday throughout the course of an athlete’s college career.

• Are student-athletes getting ripped off?

  • While $600 is not a small amount of money for most athletes (and is higher than the proposed $500 from last year), it seems like athletes should be receiving more.

    • Also, one major issue is that athletes will not earn royalties from games sold - a missed opportunity to earn residual cash and generate even more sales.

• Ambassador program is a smart move

  • To the point above regarding royalties, using ambassadors to sell and market the game makes sense. And while not every player will move the needle in terms of sales, leveraging a select few athletes who will makes a big difference.

NIL causes high school athlete to forfeit their eligibility?

Ohio high school golfer Mia Hammond can now monetize her NIL - but can’t compete on her high school team. Check out this video for more!

Thank You for reading today’s newsletter

^{I discuss insights and news related to name, image and likeness in 3 minutes or less every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 12p ET/9a PT.}

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