What Mizzou AD Laird Veatch said — and didn’t — about $2.8B House settlement

Missouri athletic director Laird Veatch spoke Thursday at Mizzou Arena about the recent changes in college athletics involving the House settlement.

U.S. Judge Claudia Wilken approved the final proposal for a near-$2.8 billion antitrust settlement Friday, resolving the House v. NCAA, Carter v. NCAA and Hubbard v. NCAA cases. The resolution involving these three cases became known as the House settlement.

Veatch spoke to media members about how Missouri plans on adjusting after releasing an official statement Sunday.

Veatch began his news conference with a disclaimer.

“This is, as you know, very much an evolving landscape, so I don’t pretend to be the expert on everything,” Veatch said. “If I can answer questions, I will. If I can provide some type of insight I will certainly do so. If I can’t or don’t there’s probably reasons for that.”

Distribution of revenue

The final approval made it so colleges can share up to $20.5 million of revenue with student-athletes throughout the next year, beginning July 1.

Veatch said Southeastern Conference schools will each not share the full $20.5 million in revenue with student-athletes, instead setting aside $2.5 million to create new scholarships and distributing the remaining $18 million.

“The bulk of our revenue-share funds will go to football (and) men’s basketball, similar to the conversation you’re seeing across the country,” Veatch said. “(That decision is) in large part in line with how money’s being generated, but also the brand value that those student-athletes bring to Mizzou.”

Veatch added that only some of the remaining sports will be involved in revenue sharing, noting that the allocation of funds can change on a year-to-year basis.

Despite programs such as LSU, Georgia and Ohio State sharing exactly which programs would receive the in-house payments, Veatch chose not to fully elaborate on where Mizzou’s money will be going.

“Until we’re at a point where this process allows for that kind of transparency across the board with all sports, I just candidly don’t see a competitive value or strategic incentive for us to disclose those specifics,” Veatch said.

Ticket prices

On Nov. 1, it was announced that Mizzou had plans to raise ticket prices for football and men’s basketball for the upcoming seasons, with the former seeing estimated admission fees and minimum donations to the athletic department up at least 50% for almost all available seats.

Veatch believes the athletic department is in a good spot six months after that decision. Veatch shared that around 85% of football season ticket holders have renewed their tickets ahead of the 2025 season.

“The response to our new fundraising efforts, how that’s been received by our donors, has been really good,” Veatch said. “I feel like we’re tracking really well. We are making significant progress.”

Player payments

Veatch also addressed his plan for paying players ahead of the July 1 window opening.

The AD said Missouri will be mostly paying its players on a monthly basis, with multiyear contracts being “an option.”

“We all, as institutions, and how we choose to operate that, can do it differently,” Veatch said. “I think you’ll see that’ll be a different thing at different places.”

Internal vs. external NIL

It was also expressed by Veatch that there are going to be three ways for student athletes to receive compensation.

On top of the traditional scholarship, there is the revenue share — what Veatch referred to as internal NIL — then there’s the third-party NIL, which Veatch called external NIL.

“You can think of that as more ‘external NIL.’ I think of it as more authentic,” Veatch said. “NIL as it was originally supposed to be.”

All third-party NIL deals from Division I athletes of at least $600 must be reported and approved by the Deloitte clearinghouse through a platform called NIL Go.

New Mizzou basketball GM position

Veatch closed the news conference answering a question surrounding the creation of the general manager position within the Missouri men’s basketball program.

Veatch explained that the definition of the GM role can vary from place to place and coach Dennis Gates wanted someone on his staff that can “really help him interact directly with agents and manage some of those kinds of elements.”

“I think that’s important that we meet coaches where their needs are,” Veatch said. “But it also has to then fit within our overall structure and have an accountability to how we manage and make sure we’re going through the process that we are establishing to meet the specifics of the House settlement.

“There’s a lot to it, but ultimately we need to continue to empower our coaches to lead.”

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