Vols up ticket costs by 10% to help pay athletes

• Chris Low, ESPN Elder WriterSep 17, 2024, 02:56 PM ET

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  • College football reporter
  • Joined ESPN.com in 2007
  • Graduate of the University of Tennessee

KNOXVILLE, Tenn.– In what’s believed to be the first plan of its kind, Tennessee fans for all sports will be charged a 10% “skill cost” on tickets to help pay athletes as part of the brand-new revenue-sharing strategy set to start in 2025.

The university shared the news with football season-ticket holders by means of email Tuesday, which included an impassioned four-minute video of athletic director Danny White telling fans the talent charge and other methods were “part of an extensive plan to continue our supremacy in college athletics and build something like never ever seen before.”

In addition to the 10% boost on all ticket invoices– season tickets and single-game purchases– as well as donations for those seats, Tennessee will add a typical boost of 4.5% on all football tickets.

“In this age of name, image and likeness (NIL), there has never ever been as close a connection in between resources and competitive success,” stated White, keeping in mind that Tennessee had actually recorded the last 3 SEC All-Sports prizes. “We wish to be a leader in college sports. That implies we want to be a leader in revenue sharing.”

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The NCAA revenue-sharing plan, arranged to begin in the fall of 2025, belongs to a settlement between the NCAA and power conferences in your house vs. NCAA case that would allow schools to share approximately $22 million of their yearly profits with professional athletes. In getting ready for those added costs, schools are becoming increasingly creative in how to raise money, and lots of college leaders believe the revenue-sharing model recently proposed is just the starting with collective bargaining coming at some point.In the most current monetary information available, the Tennessee football program turned a$75 million earnings in 2023– after $134.9 million in income and$59.1 million in expenses.At the majority of the larger schools around the country, football is the engine that assists fund much of the other sports. The Vols have a streak of 15 successive sellouts at Neyland Arena and led the SEC in total home attendance in 2023 with 713,405 fans– an average of 101,915 per game. For two straight years, Tennessee has actually sold all 70,500 of its season tickets, and White stated there’s a waiting list of 15,000. Tennessee is experiencing its best stretch of on-field success in all sports in years. The baseball group won its very first national championship in June, and Tennessee ended up being the very first school in SEC history to win a conference championship in males’s basketball, baseball and softball in the exact same year. The men’s basketball team made just its second Elite 8 appearance in school history in March, and the football team is ranked No. 6 this week in the AP poll.” Ya’ll wanted a winner, and our teams have actually responded in big

and vibrant methods, “White informed fans in the video.” … We have actually just begun this thing. “Instead of merely raising ticket rates, school authorities stated they wanted to be clear and transparent regarding why this increase is occurring and where the cash is going, prompting White to shoot the video. Ticket renewals will start Thursday and run through completion of February. Tennessee is using fans an opportunity to expand their payments over 10 months to help take in the cost increase.More than ever, Tennessee fans will have to ante up. In 2025, the most inexpensive season ticket for home football games– including taxes, the required contribution and talent cost– will cost $453.75 in the family area, which remains in the upper deck. Trainee ticket costs doubled this season from$10 per game to $20 and will increase to $25 in 2025. With additional scholarships being included sports( football is going from 85 to 105), schools opting into the brand-new income sharing plan will require approximately $30 million to cover the money going to professional athletes and cost of the additional scholarships.The Tennessee Fund raised$139.7 million in 2023-24, the greatest total in athletic department fund-raising history. The university also announced in August that it entered into a financially rewarding 20-year partnership with Knoxville-based Pilot that consists of the Pilot logo being featured on the Neyland Stadium playing field.Tennessee has actually administered large raises recently to administrators and coaches. White is now the highest-paid athletic director in the country(among public universities) at$2.75 million each year after his recent extension, and his contract remains a six-year rolling deal that runs through July 2030. He might earn as much as $600,000 more in incentives.Also, baseball coach Tony Vitello went to$3 million every year in August, making him the highest-paid baseball coach in the nation.