Tennessee football's 10% talent fee opens discussion of how many schools and sports will follow
Tennessee’s announcement of a 10% talent fee on 2025 football season tickets to help pay players could have been considered inevitable in the still-evolving era of name, image and likeness compensation
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The quiet part about the evolving landscape of name, image and likeness compensation in college athletics was bound to be said out loud, and it wasn’t that shocking when Tennessee’s athletic department stepped forward, cleared its collective throat and stated the obvious.
A week has passed since the school announced a 10% “talent fee” for 2025 football season ticket renewals to help pay its athletes and help the No. 5 Vols attract and keep the best talent. That’s in addition to a 4.5% hike that athletic director Danny White explained on video helps the program “remain flexible” as the collegiate model changes.
The price hike could be viewed as a preemptive move following an agreement to pay $2.78 billion in damages to hundreds of thousands of athletes dating to 2016. As part of that settlement, schools have agreed to distribute up to $21 million in revenue to athletes annually, starting as early next fall.
Anticipating all of that hitting their budgets, some schools have already incorporated ticket price increases. Tennessee might be the first to mention a surcharge specifically for talent as the bidding wars for top players are exposed for what they are.
“I can’t imagine that they’re going to be the only ones that announce something like that,” Louisville AD Josh Heird told The Associated Press. “It’s just, how do you feel like you can as an athletic department come up with that from that rev share number to try to compensate the student-athletes at the highest possible level?”
The NCAA in July 2021
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