How much did EA Sports pay Ole Miss to be in the College Football 25 video game?

After an 11-year absence EA Sports is bringing back its highly-popular college football video game franchise, allowing fans to play the stacked Ole Miss roster over a month before the 2024 season begins.

Part of the return of the video game is the ability for players to get compensated for being in it, but all FBS schools are also getting paid.

Through a FOIA request the media outlet cllct was able to obtain how much EA Sports is paying schools through revenue distribution based on minimum guaranteed royalties using a tiered system. There are four tiers and schools are separated in them via a point system based off how they finished in the final Associated Press Top 25 Poll the last 10 seasons (2023-2014).

If a team finished the year in the Top 25 then it received a point. The tiers were broken up as follows: Tier 1 is made up of teams that earned 6-10 points, Tier 2 group earned 2-5 points, Tier 3 were teams with one point and Tier 4 is made up of teams that never placed in the Top 25 over the last decade.

Ole Miss is in the Tier 2 group which receives $59,925.09 each. The Rebels finished in the Top 25 four times over the last 10 seasons to earn four points. Last season’s No. 9 ranking was the highest of the four years (2023, 2021, 2015, 2014).

There are 41 total teams in Tier 2 with Ole Miss, including other Southeastern Conference teams Auburn, Florida, Missouri, Mississippi State, Kentucky, Texas A&M, Texas and Tennessee.

Tier 1 teams receive just under $100,000 each and comprised of 13 teams. Alabama, Georgia, LSU and Oklahoma represent the SEC in that group.

Arkansas and South Carolina are in Tier 3 and will receive $39,950.06 each. Vanderbilt is in Tier 1 and receives just under $10,000.

The report by cllct also states that a May 2023 document sent to schools indicates how tiering systems will be structured for future editions of the game are not known. The document also stated the AP Poll was used to determine royalties in earlier editions of the game from 1997 to 2013.

Ole Miss is set to be well-represented in the game with many players opting in.

How many on the Rebels roster that chose to opt-in to the NIL agreement, which gave them $600 and a copy of the game, is not known but many star players have announced they are in it.

Quarterback Jaxson Dart, receiver Jordan Watkins and defensive lineman JJ Pegues have publicly stated they are in the game. Pegues even went as far as to make a confident prediction of what his rating should be.

“I know (Watkins) said he probably a 90, but I play offense and defense so I expect a 99 at least,” Pegues said in March.

Head coaches will not have their likeness in the game, meaning Lane Kiffin will not be seen roaming the sidelines of a virtual Vaught-Hemingway Stadium. The fifth-year Ole Miss head coach would like to be included in the next edition and would do it for a very inexpensive fee.

“My brain thinks about ‘What would help in recruiting?’ If you did pay me for that, I wouldn’t want it,” Kiffin told On3’s Andy Staples in March. “I’d want you to put it into our NIL.”

NCAA College Football 25 releases on July 19.

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