College football players urged to boycott EA’s next game

By James On Jun 8, 2023

Electronic Arts will compensate college football players for their performance in EA Sports College Footballis expected next year, but the money is so low that the College Football Players Association is pushing for a boycott of participation.

That’s according to two reportsone of them set the cash pool for all college players at $5 million, or about $500 per player. They also do not receive any royalties on sales of the game.

The college sports website ON3 spoke to Justin Falcinelli, the vice president of the CFBPA, who called it “just a ridiculously low amount.” Likewise the executive director of the group published a newsletter on Wednesday advising players not to take the deal.

Polygon has reached out to an EA Sports representative for comment.

Falcinelli, to ON3explained that his organization had contacted current NFL players and was told that royalty checks recently ranged from $17,000 to $28,000 for players appearing on the Madden NFL series under the NFL Players Association group license.

Sportico reported in May that EA had joined OneTeam Partners to enter into a group licensing deal, also setting the pool at $5 million for approximately 10,000 eligible Football Bowl Subdivision players (the highest level of college play).

EA Sports had been developing and publishing an NCAA Football video game for about 20 years until 2013, when developments in a lawsuit filed by a former basketball player made the publisher’s situation untenable.

Athletes have recently been paid for so-called NIL (name, image, and likeness) deals that would have made them ineligible to continue playing in the past, after a California law guaranteed college athletes’ right to be paid for using their likeness eventually changed the NCAA’s rules across the country. With the changes to the NCAA’s NIL and eligibility policies, EA announced in February 2021 that the College Football series would return.

EA, a licensing partner, and the NCAA eventually settled that 2013 case for $40 million, an amount that covered several years of players appearing in the game and not being compensated – but an amount that is still nearly three times that of the game. per player, what EA offers players for 2024 EA Sports College Football.