Kirk Herbstreit proposes bringing ‘NCAA Football’ back by giving players free copies

ESPN commentator Kirk Herbstreit, who was also the man telling you to punt more frequently in the final editions of EA Sports’ NCAA Football series, discussed the end of the game with the AJC’s SEC Country:

“Every single college football player,” he said. “You know what they’d love for their compensation to be? Just give ‘em a free game. That’s the compensation that they would take.

“I’ve never met one player in college football that’s like: ‘They can’t use my name and likeness! I need to be paid!’ They’re just thrilled to be on the game. They love being on the game. It’s like the biggest highlight of their life, is to be on the game.”

The series ended amid lawsuits over likeness rights. EA quite clearly had been putting actual people in its commercial products without paying them, meaning it had stuck itself between NCAA laws and actual laws. The company’s been vague about its future plans for the series, last week denying a cryptic Facebook video was meant to hint at its return.

A $60 copy of a video game would be quite a bit less than what players stand to receive from the $60 million in court settlements, which sounds something like $1,000 per player per year. But a $60 video game that stars you is worth a lot more to you than $60, it’s fair to say.

Hey, let’s poll players on this.

Herbstreit also had some disgruntled things to say about Ed O’Bannon, a former amateur athlete whose likeness helped a large corporation make money and the man whose lawsuit started all this.

Cam Newton and Carson Palmer will make some NFL Heisman history against each other. Some of you younger folks might’ve forgotten the Cardinals QB won a Heisman, so get ready to hear about it all week.

The Ohio State University just absorbed the University of Maryland. The Ohio State-College Park campus. That’s what it feels like after Urban Meyer yanked eight stars’ worth of recruit out of the Terps’ claws in the space of five minutes, including prized QB Dwayne Haskins. Oh, and OSU also added a four-star receiver around that time.

Maryland fans are picking up the pieces and reminding each other that verbal commitments make for a stupid system anyway.

Arkansas is almost exactly on course for its usual top-25-ish recruiting class, but #BERT still has far more talented irons in the fire than the Hogs usually have this time of year. Talented irons.

Hey, Tennessee’s decade of sadness is over. That’s pretty good. Rocky Top Talk reflects on the decade of sadness.

UCLA flips former Arizona QB commit Devon Modster, a four-star with a last name that sounds like a 2001 Counter-Strike maps forum.

LSU is sending nine early entries to the NFL Draft. That’s not true. It’s just one. You’d believe nine, though, wouldn’t you? The Tigers are preeeeeeeetty loaded for next season.

Also coming back to the SEC West is Championship Offensive Player of the Game O.J. Howard, and Bama’s likewise returning a bit more talent than we’re used to.

The previous two items mean this story on how huge LSU-Bama has become will likely be valid again in about 10 months.

Jim Harbaugh is weird. A recruit Snapchatted the Michigan coach climbing a tree. I don’t think we know why.