Final summer time, one of the vital sought-after recruits in faculty soccer wasn’t a quarterback or a defensive lineman. It was a 21-year-old YouTuber in Kentucky.
James Bordeaux had put out a sequence of movies and Twitter posts to slim down which college he would play as in his first Dynasty Mode rebuild video after the discharge of the EA Sports activities Faculty Soccer 25 online game. His self-started marketing campaign bought a lot consideration that soccer packages reached out, sending gear and graphics as if he had been a prospect. The winner: Nebraska. The ensuing video bought 1.1 million views.
Many see YouTube as the way forward for sports activities consumption. The NFL will broadcast its Chiefs vs. Chargers Week 1 recreation on YouTube in September. However for youthful followers, YouTube is the current. Polling signifies Gen Z spends extra time watching highlights than it does reside video games. Golf has developed an enormous presence on the platform.
Earlier than NCAA athletes had been allowed to monetize their title, picture and likeness, former UCF kicker Donald de la Haye was pressured to decide on between his YouTube channel and persevering with to play faculty soccer in 2017. He selected YouTube and now has greater than 6.2 million subscribers.
Faculty sports activities fandom has lengthy been led by old school booster golf equipment and message boards that popped up 20 years in the past. However YouTube is turning into a brand new floor for school fandom, particularly with the return of EA Sports activities Faculty Soccer, and dozens of individuals like Bordeaux have turned creating movies in regards to the online game right into a full-time job, gaining sufficient affect to affect the sport itself.
“It reveals how deep folks’s love for his or her group is that they had been so serious about what a random man on the web was going to do, as a result of it might be their group,” he stated.
Bordeaux began his YouTube channel 4 years in the past as a excessive schooler who simply wished to speak about his favourite online game, which he’d been enjoying since he was 6.
He took viewers on hours-long journeys in earlier editions of the NCAA Soccer online game, like rebuilding Kansas soccer or creating North Dakota State as an FBS program. His first aim was to make $100 a day from YouTube’s creator ad-revenue program.
The channel hit that mark shortly and saved rising, so Bordeaux dropped out of faculty at Northern Kentucky, moved to Florida and made it his full-time job. He now has greater than 476,000 subscribers, and he says he spends 80 hours per week on it throughout soccer season alongside a group of three editors, making movies with titles like “5 Years to Rebuild the WORST CFB 25 Group” or “Can I Win a Title with ONLY Gamers from Hawaii?”
“It took off so quick that I had no selection however to maintain pouring hours into it,” he stated. “I dropped out a couple of months after beginning it, which was dangerous, wanting again on it. Type of dumb. But it surely paid off.”
Gaming is very large on YouTube. A current report from the corporate acknowledged that 60 % of the highest 1,000 channels on YouTube had uploaded not less than one gaming video. The rise of “Let’s Play” movies, the place creators movie themselves enjoying and reacting to video games, modified the way in which builders produce video games which might be customizable and, theoretically, by no means finish.
That applies to sports activities video games, particularly the Faculty Soccer franchise. There’s no speed-run to “beat” the sport. With 136 FBS groups and varied recreation modes, YouTube creators have an abundance of quest choices.
“You possibly can play Madden and win the Tremendous Bowl, however the place do you go after that?” stated Faculty Soccer principal recreation designer Ben Haumiller, who has spent greater than 20 years at EA Sports activities. “We’ve fixed roster turnover. You can begin at South Alabama and work your approach as much as Alabama. You possibly can carry the choice to Michigan or go rebuild the Pac-12. Issues like that, no different recreation will get to inform.”
There’s nobody approach to go about being a school soccer online game YouTuber. Former faculty and NFL quarterback Kurt Benkert (351,000 followers) mixes actual and online game soccer technique. One other creator, Eric Rayweather (637,000 subscribers), turned soccer recreation tutorials right into a full-time job.
Rayweather, 37, was a profitable Madden participant greater than a decade in the past, successful tournaments and climbing on-line rankings. As he bought older, bought married and didn’t have as a lot time to play, he’d search for ideas on-line and didn’t discover a lot. So he drew on his expertise and started making Madden tutorial movies, comparable to one of the best ways to beat a Cowl 4 protection or use glitch performs found within the recreation.
A 12 months into it, he was making extra money by way of YouTube than from his jobs at a paint retailer and Greatest Purchase, so he made YouTube his full-time job in 2018.
“I had bit of cash saved up and thought, I’ve bought a 12 months, I might do that out,” stated Rayweather, who lives in Louisiana. “It was scary, as a result of it might’ve gone the opposite approach. But it surely grew much more, and I haven’t regarded again since then.”
Rayweather expanded his tutorials to varsity soccer when the sport returned and started to lean into information updates. Any leak or announcement that comes out in regards to the subsequent recreation, he jumps on and makes a brand new video about it.
Rayweather estimated he spends 12 hours a day on the job right now of 12 months. That schedule slows a bit after a recreation comes out, then shrinks to as little as 4 hours a day when soccer season ends. In contrast to another creators, he’s a one-man operation.
“Proper now, it’s pedal to the metallic,” he stated.
For a very long time, EA Sports activities builders weren’t allowed to interact with the gaming group, usually solely talking with online game journalists. However because the trade modified, YouTubers turned influential and trusted voices.
“Again within the day, each reviewing outlet had a devoted sports activities individual,” Haumiller stated. “Now, they’re extra freelancers who don’t know as a lot about your recreation. It’s these (YouTubers) pointing issues out that we have to do higher and know the sport simply in addition to we do.
“The notion of your recreation nowadays has so much to do with the notion from the group.”
EA Sports activities has leaned in to earn the favor of that group. For years, the corporate has invited gaming journalists and YouTubers to Orlando to get an early have a look at Madden and now Faculty Soccer.
When EA Sports activities held the key Faculty Soccer 26 cowl photograph shoot on the Rose Bowl, Bordeaux was there to doc it for his channel. Every week earlier than CFB26 was launched, EA Sports activities enlisted Bordeaux and Rayweather to provide public reveal movies of Dynasty and Gameplay options. Some creators have additionally created sponsored social media posts for the sport, marking them as adverts.
As you look ahead to WWL, get an unique have a look at #CFB26 tonight together with your favourite creators.
🎮 @PapaMeagzz at 6pm ET🎮 @EricRayweather at 7pm ET🎮 @bordeauxyoutube at 8pm ET
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— EASPORTSCollege (@EASPORTSCollege) July 2, 2025
“They’re advocates, good or unhealthy,” Haumiller stated. “They’re additionally a tutorial for us. You possibly can go on and see these guys doing alternative ways to recruit in CFB 25 or present nice performs to make use of. They actually assist us train the sport in a approach we aren’t in a position to.”
Some followers have questioned the legitimacy of a evaluate from a creator if EA Sports activities performed a task in facilitating it or paid that creator for earlier sponsored posts. Bordeaux lately had a small on-line feud with one other creator, Ryan Moody, whose content material is basically detrimental towards EA Sports activities. Bordeaux has tried to reveal when EA Sports activities was concerned with a put up.
“I do really feel unhealthy for these guys, as a result of they do form of join this extra punishment they get when all they get in return is possibly a code a pair days early,” Haumiller stated. “They’re not on the payroll or getting all types of insider entry.”
Surveys present extra youngsters aspire to be YouTubers or streamers than scientists or astronauts. The rise of entertainers like Logan and Jake Paul or Mr. Beast has proven a brand new path for youthful those that didn’t exist even a couple of years in the past.
Bordeaux by no means imagined how shortly this might turn out to be a profession.
“Possibly one thing I did on the aspect for enjoyable to make slightly further money,” he stated, “however I didn’t suppose I might ever personally attain the sub or view depend I’ve been blessed to have.”
Rayweather’s recommendation to aspiring YouTubers is to have a plan and stick with it, be educated and deal with good audio. Bordeaux joined him in emphasizing the significance of constant posting.
“Anyone could make not less than a aspect dwelling doing any kind of creation,” Rayweather stated. “Be informational. Assist folks. Give them worth for one thing.”
Days earlier than the CFB 26 launch, Bordeaux was as soon as once more narrowing down finalists for his first dynasty rebuild. Marshall coach Tony Gibson tweeted at him and bought the Herd into Bordeaux’s prime 5. Central Michigan coach Matt Drinkall tweeted a photograph of Bordeaux on the stadium video board.
I simply love the thought of random those that do not know who I’m seeing posts like this from their schools head soccer coach and being so confused https://t.co/HT4oNbcaoS
— Bordeaux (@bordeauxyoutube) July 3, 2025
Recruiting by no means stops in faculty soccer, and courting a YouTuber is now as precious as another form of superstar. The media trade is much from the times when coaches welcomed an airplane filled with sportswriters for a promotional tour half a century in the past.
The return of the school soccer online game has put the game again in entrance of a technology of recent and outdated followers. However the cascade impact has additionally created a brand new assortment of influencers — and a profitable enterprise — on the brand new frontier of fandom.
(Photograph courtesy of Bordeaux)
