"Most EA Sports games are distinguished by year, as most games are released on a yearly basis. However, as EA Sports is the leading purchaser of official licenses, it is not uncommon that in a short span several games of the same sport but with different licenses are released: FIFA 98 was shortly followed by World Cup 98 (as EA has the license for the FIFA World Cup and the European Football Championship, each happening regularly in four-year intervals), and college football and basketball games are released that are based on Madden NFL and NBA Live, respectively."
Source: Wikipedia, "Ea_sports", available under the CC-BY-SA License.