College sponsor patches on uniforms could unlock hundreds of millions, NCAA approval seen looming

Sponsor patches on college uniforms would unlock hundreds of millions of dollars in new revenue for the 67 power-conference schools and Notre Dame once the NCAA approves the practice, Learfield President and CEO Cole Gahagan told The Associated Press. He said the patch program could begin in short order and that NCAA approval was expected within months. Patches on the front, back or sleeves of jerseys are common in international soccer and have become widespread in the NBA, NHL, MLS and Major League Baseball in recent years. Last year, the 23 MLB teams with jersey patches generated about $204 million from those ads, according to sports marketing data firm SponsorUnited. “There’s no reason why college should sit behind those leagues with that opportunity, as sizable as it is,” Gahagan said. Other than the logo of a school’s apparel sponsor, corporate branding patches on uniforms are prohibited by the NCAA. But the NCAA’s decision last year to allow commercial advertisements on football fields makes the prospect of uniform patches seem inevitable. “It’ll come, and it should come,” Nebraska athletic director Troy Dannen said. “As part of the NCAA modernizing its rules, it’s overdue.”

A potential holdup would be exclusivity clauses in schools’ contracts with apparel partners. Brands such as adidas, Nike and Under Armour do not allow marks of other corporate sponsors on the uniforms they supply. Gahagan said he and other stakeholders have had promising conversations with the apparel companies to ease that restriction. Learfield in December announced a program that would provide additional marketing opportunities for the apparel providers in exchange for allowing other jersey patches. Nike and Under Armour did not respond to requests for comment and Adidas declined to comment. Texas Tech athletic director Kirby Hocutt said he didn’t foresee his apparel sponsor being a roadblock. “I’ve found that adidas in everything we’ve had conversations about — jersey patches included — has been open minded and reasonable and willing to consider any opportunity that’s going to advance Texas Tech athletics,” he said. Nebraska and Texas Tech, like most other power-conference programs, are spending the maximum $20.5 million on direct revenue-sharing payments to athletes this school year. They’ve had to be creative in finding ways to fund the new expense, and Hocutt said jersey patches show promise. “It’s definitely something that is in the sponsorship deck that we’re presenting to select partners about that opportunity in anticipation of it happening,” Hocutt said. “Do we have a deal on deck? Not quite yet.” For some schools, Dannen said, the patches might not be as lucrative as believed. When a school grants its multimedia rights to companies such as Learfield or Playfly, the school is paid a guaranteed amount of money to have the rights-holder handle all marketing and advertising. Nebraska in 2022 signed a 15-year, $300 million contract with Playfly. Under the terms, Nebraska receives a $13.5 million guarantee for its multimedia rights in 2025-26. For revenue Playfly generates in excess of $20 million in 2025-26, Nebraska receives a 72.5% royalty. Hypothetically, if Playfly didn’t reach the $20 million threshold and jersey patches were included in the multimedia rights deal, Nebraska would not receive any of the proceeds from the patches. Dannen said jersey patches weren’t on the radar in 2022 and would be considered new inventory that would need assessment. He suggested it might be more advantageous for schools to negotiate as a conference and pursue jersey patch rights collectively, noting, “If you jump in now, and I’m going to get a little bit (of money) because of the jersey patches, I would really like to see if there’s an opportunity for our conference to put all those jersey patch rights together and all of a sudden they’re worth a whole lot more to the institutions when 18 are playing instead of just one.”