Last year, EA offered 11,000 players payment of $500 (plus a free copy of the game) for allowing their names, images, and likenesses to be used in the resurrected college football video game. This year, the deal is being sweetened.
Via multiple reports, EA has bumped the offer to $1,500 per player. Amana Christovich of FrontOfficeSports.com adds that negotiations are ongoing regarding the possibility of players receiving royalties over and above the payment.
Like last year, some players will receive more than $1,500 as “ambassadors” of the game.
It’s unclear why EA increased the payment by 150 percent. Maybe it was guilt. The 2025 edition of the college football franchise became the highest-selling U.S. sports video game of all time.
Regardless, EA benefits from the fact that players generally want to be in the game. Which will make most of them far less likely to drive a hard bargain and/or refuse to participate. Which helps drive profits higher for EA.
It’s still better than the old days, where EA used the image and likeness without the name and didn’t pay anything to anyone. After the Ed O’Bannon case exposed the illegality of the old system, in which players were prevented by the NCAA from getting anything for their NIL, EA pulled the plug on the franchise until it was able to compensate players and no longer infringe on their images and likenesses.
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