Monday morning, the EA SPORTS College Football 25 social media accounts shared that in just 12 days after offering them contracts, over 10,000 student-athletes had already opted in to appear in the game ahead of the reported April 30 deadline to decide.
To put this number into perspective, if EA offered 85 players (as rumored) on all 131 teams (service academy players are not yet eligible to opt-in), then 11,135 contracts were offered in total. If 10,000 opted in, that would mean nearly 90% of players will be in the game as of today. Two other ways to put this number into scale: it would be the equivalent of all but 12 full teams being in the game or an average of just 8-9 holdouts per school with over eight weeks to go. Later in the day, VP of Global Marketing, Communications, and Partnerships for EA SPORTS John Reseburg tweeted that more players "are joining every hour."
However, on Monday evening Anwar Richardson of OrangeBloods.com tweeted that multiple people had told him that Texas QB Arch Manning would be opting out of appearing in the title in order to 'focus on playing football on the field.' Partaking in NIL deals has been very rare for the former highly coveted recruit. To date, his only accepted agreement has been with Panini America where proceeds from an event ($100,000) went to a Central Texas non-profit.
In a December Sports Illustrated article, Manning stated that "I'm not involved with my NIL. You would have to ask my dad about that." ('That' referring to reports he was making more through NIL deals than Brock Purdy earned with his rookie contract with the NFL's 49ers.) If that remains the case, it is a possibility that the 'no' decision may have came from father Cooper and not Arch.
10k and counting... pretty pretttyyy good #CFB25 pic.twitter.com/RrO88VWjWM
— EASPORTSCollege (@EASPORTSCollege) March 4, 2024In 10 days from opening our NIL program for @EASPORTSCollege Football, more than 10,000 athletes have opted-in. They're in the game, and more are joining every hour. 🔥🔥🔥 https://t.co/pHH9cLmdx9
— John Reseburg (@jrese_original) March 4, 2024Multiple people have told me Texas redshirt quarterback Arch Manning will not opt into EA Sports College Football 25. I'm told Arch is focused on playing football on the field. pic.twitter.com/dCFHdAuMZ1
— Anwar Richardson (@AnwarRichardson) March 5, 2024
