Brett Yormark expects football officials to have commercial patches 'soon'

Big 12 Commissioner Brett Yormark made it clear during his opening statement at the conference’s media days that the conference is looking for as many revenue streams as possible.

One of those potential ways to find revenue for the Big 12 as a conference is by putting commercial patches on the uniforms worn by officials at sporting events. That’s not allowed as of now, but Yormark expects that to change soon.

“We will push at the NCAA level,” Brett Yormark said. “In fact, I love what they recently did with on-field logos. I’ve been very vocal about the NCAA to push for making commercial patches permissible for officials’ uniforms, similar to what the NBA has done.”

The specific NBA patches that Yormark referred to are red blocks that advertise Emirates on the NBA referees’ uniforms. The NBA also, notably, allows small logo patches on player uniforms.

“I’ve spoken to our football officials, and they are in favor of it, and I’m optimistic this will happen soon,” Yormark said.

Brett Yormark went on to add that the conference is exploring all of its options. That includes the naming rights for the conference and a potential infusion of private equity to the conference.

There are a lot of reasons in the modern game era of college sports why these different ways of making revenue are so important, particularly to the Big 12. For one, the recent House settlement is still something that leaders around college sports are still trying to understand the long-term impact of on budgets. Then, there is a growing financial gap between the Big 12 and the SEC and Big Ten from their respective media deals.

Interestingly, Yormark didn’t expand on how much revenue he believes would come in from these potential patches or what types of companies would be interested in using them. Still, the fact that he’s pushing for them indicates that there is a belief it could have a legitimate impact.

Brett Yormark, Big 12 exploring selling conference naming rights to title sponsor

In June, it was reported that Brett Yormark was exploring selling the naming rights to the Big 12 to a title sponsor, similar to how bowl games will have a title sponsor.

In his reporting on the story, ESPN’s Pete Thamel noted that this deal could bring in “hundreds of millions over the course of the deal” to the Big 12. That’s important money for the conference that would have a major impact in the long run.