By The Associated Press
Kirk Herbstreit and Chris Fowler are in the game.
ESPN “College GameDay” analyst Herbstreit and network broadcaster Fowler announced Thursday on social media they will be voices in EA Sports' upcoming college football video game. Analysts David Pollack and Jesse Palmer made similar announcements.
The broadcasting updates came the same day that media outlets, including ESPN, reported FBS football players were receiving invitations from EA Sports to have their name, image and likeness in the game, which the developer has said would be launching in summer 2024.
John Reseburg, vice president of marketing, communications and partnerships at EA Sports, said Thursday on social media that the game is a “scale of NIL that has never been done before.”
“More than 11,000 individual NIL deals all at once. Guaranteed income for athletes that opt-in. It’s in the game," Reseburg tweeted.
EA Sports College Football 25 will feature all 134 FBS teams, the video-game developer announced.
Notre Dame's inclusion had been a big question mark since the school said in 2021 it would not participate “until such time as rules have been finalized governing the participation of our student-athletes.” But the Fighting Irish's athletic director, Jack Swarbrick, said Tuesday they're in.
“The work that EA SPORTS is doing to provide over 11,000 college student-athletes opportunities to benefit directly from their name, image and likeness is a first-of-its-kind undertaking and we’re proud to have been involved in the process,” Swarbrick said in a statement on social media.
Sean O’Brien, EA Sports vice president of business development, told ESPN that players who opt in will receive $600 and a copy of the game.
A generic avatar created “based on the traditional strength or weakness of a position over the past decade for that school" will be used in place of players who opt out, Daryl Holt, EA Sports senior vice president, told ESPN.
Holt also told the network that gamers will not be able to create an opted-out player, but “I won’t reveal how we’re dealing with that."