Recently, ESPN featured a story on their Web site highlighting how to obtain rosters for the acclaimed video game series, NCAA Football by EA Sports.
Unfortunately, most likely unbeknownst to ESPN, the person they were profiling is universally known in the video-gaming world as a thief who will steal the rosters from other people and then sell them for profit.
While stealing rosters from someone else is just morally wrong, it is illegal to sell them for profit. I'm not going to link to the story nor say what Web site people are getting these rosters from because there are a select few people that will still ignore this column and go to that Web site anyway to buy rosters.
I'm here to tell you that rosters can be obtained for free in multiple places. When I say "rosters," I mean names attached to the players.
If you've ever played a version of NCAA Football, you would know that by default, players are labeled as "QB #2" or "HB #25." This is because it is illegal for EA Sports to make a profit off the names and likenesses of NCAA athletes.
Every year, there are some great people in the NCAA Football community who will go through hundreds of hours of manual labor to enter these full names for players, edit their accessories (arm bands, helmets, facemasks, gloves, etc.), and correct team depth charts to get the most realistic feel possible for the game.
For those of you who are fans of the series, I beg of you, this gaming season when you are looking for rosters, DO NOT USE ANY SITE THAT CLAIMS IT WILL SELL ROSTERS TO YOU.
Listed below are just a few sites that can be utilized to find free rosters from if you do not play online.
www.fairdale-kings.com
This site isn't currently up and running, but it will be by release day. This is home to Fairdale Kings' rosters, the original king of rosters for the XBox.
He does all the rosters himself and puts "signatures" in them, such as a strategically placed armband on a fourth-string linebacker to put his own touch on the rosters to make them his own.
This is how the given person who was profiled by ESPN was caught stealing rosters. All of these signatures from other roster editors were showing up in the set of rosters he was selling.
Fairdale Kings uploads the roster file to his website for download and he offers a mailing service where he will allow you to mail in your memory card, put the rosters on it, and send it back to you.
Fairdale Kings does all his work for free, but most people will send a donation in to him for his hard work, and I strongly encourage this act of kindness.
www.freencaa09rosters.com
This site will also be offering free downloads for every system this season. This site was created mostly to combat the story that was posted on ESPN's Web site, and the video game community is using this website to spread the word about free rosters for this year's game.
www.operationsports.com and the MaddenMania forum
Found at www.operationsports.com/mm, both offer free roster downloads for every system available. These two sites are where the main roster editors reside and post their work first.
Multiple GREAT sources can be found in both site's forums where you can even interact with the roster makers to make suggestions for your favorite team's roster.
These two sites will also be offering a "Custom Sounds" section to download from since this season's NCAA Football game will allow custom sounds into the game at certain points.
If you want House of Pain's "Jump Around" to play at Camp Randall to start the fourth quarter and you need a copy of the song, head to these sites to download the audio file.
On top of those sites, the "EA Locker" during online play will be available to swap roster files in.
So, I'm writing this column not to advertise other web sites, but to let people know that there are free resources all over the internet to download rosters from. I pray that this is the year that nobody buys their rosters and encourages this illegal work.
Happy gaming to all with your new rosters, and now we'll just patiently wait for NCAA Football 2009 to drop on July 15.
19 comments Last one added 11 months ago — Leave a Comment
Nino Colla about 1 year ago
I've used I think MaddenMania for one roster update before. Very pleased.
I'll have to remember this site come NCAA time. I love having the real rosters, cause I like then importing draft classes to Madden. Thanks for all the great links!
It's a shame there are people out there profiting off the work of others. Putting those names in is a tedious job. I do it for Michigan's roster every year and it is a major pain. So, every name for every team is a lot of hard work. The ones who do it that don't charge are very generous.
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Henry Barnum about 1 year ago
PSXsports.com has free rosters as well.
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Kyle Schwerin about 1 year ago
Do NOT go to PSXsports.com. That site is run by the inventor of roster-stealing and the first guy to ever get outed in the community for stealing other people's rosters, DT Linder. That guy is worse than the one ESPN featured. DT doesn't charge for rosters, but rather will ask for you to send your memory card and then he won't mail it back to you unless you give him a "donation," and on top of that, he is a frequent stealer of other people's rosters to use as his own as well. For the last 5 years, his rosters have come out hours after blacklover's rosters on MaddenMania, with all the same signature "errors" that blacklover has put in to his rosters.
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Bailey Divio about 1 year ago
Dude. You are talking about the wrong person. DT was the first person to come up with the idea of offering free rosters. Blacklover hasn't been around for years. You can't compare a roster competitor with a roster thief like Brian Kaldenberg.
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asd sf about 1 year ago
Kyle, that's not true at all man.
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Kyle Schwerin about 1 year ago
PSXsports is an offshoot of PS2Rosters.com, which was founded by DT. When NCAA first started coming out on PS2, blacklover was the one making rosters, and DT was outed by the community for stealing them, having blacklover's "signatures" in DT's own rosters. There were also double-digit cases of DT keeping people's memory cards and/or demanding "donations" before he sent their memory cards back. You can see these accounts just by going back three years on nearly any Madden/NCAA-related message board. Also - blacklover has been around, as me, him, and two other members of the community collaborated on last year's PS2 rosters.
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Manuel Cuevas about 1 year ago
Fairdale Kings is the best. I'd go to him for all your roster needs. And of course, it's FREE. fairdale-kings.com
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Victor Vasquez 12 months ago
If you have never played NCAA Football with the actual names on your rosters than you don't know what you're missing. The names of all the players actually show up in the game, and the announcers say the names too. Visit www.fairdale-kings.com and get the FREE rosters for yourself. Or just download them via the EA Locker. You will be glad you did.
Getting rosters for NCAA Football has never been easier. Here’s how you use the EA Locker feature for the Xbox 360:
* On the main menu for NCAA Football 09, click ‘Online’
* Then click on ‘EA Locker’
* Then enter in the Gamertag: FAIRDALE KINGS
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Micah Byrd 11 months ago
I used PSX for the previous two or three seasons and it never occurred to me that I could have gotten the rosters for free. I think that as long as someone does the work a donation isn't out of the question-PROVIDED that they actually do the work. If DT is stealing the rosters of other people, which I am not going to say he is or isn't doing, then he's a scumbag. After spending weeks typing all of that crap in, I think that everyone who'd show up at this site knows how low that is. Just throwing that out there.
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Tom Otto 11 months ago
Where can i go to get free 2009 NCAA rosters for my PS3?
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tim stanley 11 months ago
where can i get 2009 NCAA roster for PS3
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andrew judge 11 months ago
i would like to say thank you for this very helpful information :)
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Steve B 11 months ago
You can buy pre-loaded memory cards here http://www.ncaaroster.info/ and these rosters will be made available on the EA locker in the future.
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Steve B 11 months ago
You can buy pre-loaded memory cards here http://www.ncaaroster.info/ and these rosters will be made available on the EA locker in the future.
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Timmah Pierce 11 months ago
Is there a way to DL from a website onto your PS3 using the PS3 browser... instead of using a flash drive?
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Sean B 11 months ago
Thanks to the guys at EArosters.com for their very accurate and easy to use roster download, I have been playing ncaa football for years and have always wanted the roster names, this is the first year I'll have them, very excited, thank you earosters!!!!!
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Ryan Kuczynski 11 months ago
Do you have to be the host's friend in order to download something from them?
I have read good things about FAIRDALE KINGS but i can not download anything from them....
Any help is greatly appreciated!
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Kyle Schwerin 11 months ago
Fairdale Kings doesn't have rosters up yet because the 360 version of NCAA 09 has a glitch which crashes the game if you edit the rosters too much right now. There is a patch being released by EA sometime in the beginning of August to fix this, and FK's rosters will be released then on his website at www.fairdale-kings.com
PS3 Rosters and my own PS2 rosters can be found at www.operationsports.com/forums and www.operationsports.com/mm
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Jason Mann 11 months ago
is there anywat someone can just e-mail me the rosters and ill put them in myself, i dont have my ps2 or ps3 online at the moment, jlmann77@gmail.com
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