Reports: Big 12 discussing naming rights deal with Allstate
Jun 13, 2024, 10:50 AM
Big 12 logo. (Photo by Ron Jenkins/Getty Images)
(Photo by Ron Jenkins/Getty Images)
The Big 12 is considering becoming the first conference to agree to a naming-rights deal with its conference brand. It is in discussions about doing so with insurance company Allstate, reports Action Network and Yahoo! Sports.
It would effectively change the Big 12’s name to include a corporate name. Under consideration, reports Action Network’s Brett McMurphy, are “The Big Allstate Conference” or the “The Allstate 12 Conference.” The conference is also considering a deal with a “financial company,” according to McMurphy.
A deal would bring in hundreds of millions of dollars, according to Yahoo! Sports’ Ross Dellenger.
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That would shrink the financial distances between the Big 12 and the SEC and Big Ten, whose media rights agreements greatly outpace other power conferences.
The Big 12 under third-year commissioner Brett Yormark is not stopping there. According to Dellenger, he is considering pursuing private equity agreements to generate more millions of dollars.
The commissioner has been aggressive since taking over in August 2022, coming to a new media rights agreement with ESPN and FOX and adding four new universities to the conference this coming 2024 fall season.
Yormark last Thursday met with the Arizona Board of Regents to discuss the changes occurring within college athletics, which appear on the way to more directly paying its student-athletes.
“We’re very bullish on our future for all the right reasons and we got considerably stronger throughout the board through realignment,” he said. “Again, the University of Arizona and Arizona State play a big role in that.”
Big 12 Conference naming rights already part of college sports
A commercial agreement between a college athletics conference and brand would be similar to how bowl games are named.
Locally in Arizona, we have the VRBO Fiesta Bowl, Guaranteed Rate Bowl and Snoop Dog Arizona Bowl presented by Gin & Juice by Dre and Snoop.
Colleges have individually become more creative with naming rights deals to increase their financial platforms.
Arizona State, which along with rival Arizona will join the Big 12 this coming fall semester, renamed Sun Devil Stadium to Mountain America Stadium last August. That rights deal for 15 years is worth more than $50 million, according to Phoenix Business Journal.
