It is no secret that NIL spending is up across the board this college football offseason. But Texas coach Steve Sarkisian pushed back on the report from earlier this spring that his Longhorns dished out $35-40 million across what they hope to be a national championship squad. Sarkisian’s denial of the massive payroll came after 247Sports’ Chip Brown reported the $40 million price tag was an inaccurate figure.
“What’s frustrating on that is it was a little bit of irresponsible reporting,” Sarkisian told SiriusXM of the initial Houston Chronicle report. “It was one anonymous source said that was what our roster was. I wish I had $40 million on our roster. We’d probably be a little bit better team than we are.”
While Texas is insistent that it did not spend that exorbitant amount of money to build its 2025 team, others detailed that the top of the college football market reached approximately $40 million during the 2025 recruiting and transfer portal cycles. Indiana’s Curt Cignetti said to CBS Sports this spring that many of the top programs allocated tens of millions to their talent acquisition efforts.
The race to keep up with $40 million rosters is shaking college football
John Talty
The surge in NIL distribution across college football is a response to the looming NCAA vs. House settlement, which will soon limit the amount of money programs can funnel to their rosters. The settlement will institute a revenue-sharing model in which schools have approximately $20 million to directly pay their athletes across all sports.
“What’s crazy about this day and age that you guys operate in — and I’ve watched this for 25 years now — the evolution of Twitter and social media and podcasts; one guy writes an article from an anonymous source that says that’s what our roster is,” said Sarkisian. “Everybody ran with it. And I’m talking real publications ran with it. And it’s like, ‘That’s what’s going on at Texas.’ Nobody asked me one question. Like, okay, sure. But if that’s what you think, that’s fine. If that’s the narrative you want to paint for our team, that’s fine.”
Texas, on paper, boasts one of the most talent-rich rosters in the nation ahead of the 2025 season. Potential superstar Arch Manning is on the precipice of his first full seasons as the Longhorns’ starting quarterback and boasts a bevy of returning playmakers around him. That is in addition to the program’s first top-ranked high school recruiting class, which will arrive on campus in full this summer.
Even if that crop of talent did not cost Texas $40 million, the reality is that it was not free.
“The idea to think that a lot of other schools are spending money to get players, I mean, it’s the state of college football right now,” Sarkisian said. “It is what it is. Hey, we’re fortunate. Don’t get me wrong. We’ve got great support. Chris Del Conte, our athletic director, does a fantastic job. And our donors, and people are excited and we’ve been to the CFP two years in a row and we’ve had, I don’t know, 20-something guys drafted the last two years. So it’s been great. It’s been a great run.
“I wish I had about another $15 million or so, though. Might have a little better roster.”
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