MMAdness - Issues Surrounding the Legalization of Mixed Martial Arts in NY

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Location: New York County Lawyers Association Building, 14 Vesey Street, New York, New York

Time: 6:00pm

Confirmed Speakers: Kurt Emhoff, Esq., attorney, Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman and licensed boxing manager, and Paul Haberman, Esq., licensed boxing manager and Chair, Entertainment, Media, Intellectual Property and Sports Law Committee's (EMIPS) Sports Law Subcommittee. More speakers to come from both sides of the debate, stay tuned!

Panelists will discuss the legal and regulatory issues relating to the legalization of mixed martial arts in New York, as well as its potential economic impact if it were legalized.

Sponsor: EMIPS Committee of the New York County Lawyers Association
FREE

RSVP: dlamb@nycla.org

NBPA Calls for End to Age Requirement

This afternoon ESPN.com reported that the National Basketball Players Association has called for an end to the league's age requirement. This is an interesting development on a few fronts:

First, as we know from the case Clarett v. Nat'l Football League, some courts have found that sports leagues' age requirements are immune to antitrust challenge as long as they are collectively bargained with the union. Thus, if the NBPA no longer consents to an age requirement, it will become easier for a prospective NBA player to challenge the age requirement under Section 1 of the Sherman Act. (For more on this point, see Michael McCann's article on the legality of age restrictions in the NBA and NFL, and my article on the same general point under both U.S. and EU law).

Second, as I have suggested in a forthcoming law review article, sports unions that agree to an age requirement may face some risk of a lawsuit under labor law's duty of fair representation. By seeking to remove this age requirement, the NBPA reduces their risk.

Finally, the NBPA's change of position on an age requirement signals it may play hardball in the upcoming round of labor negotiations with the league.

Bowl Battle for Sports Law Blog

The Golden Panthers of FIU, Sun Belt Conference champions, will play the University of Toledo Rockets in the Little Caesars Bowl in Detroit on December 26. As you know, I teach at FIU; my co-editor, Geoff Rapp, teaches at Toledo.

Is another food wager in the offing? May I propose stone crabs and key lime pie as the food of South Florida.

Gender Eligibility Rules in Golf

Earlier this week, LPGA members voted to remove the "female at birth" eligibility rule from its bylaws. The rule change comes on the heels of a federal lawsuit filed in October 2010 by Lana Lawless. Doug Robson provides a comprehensive overview of the Lawless case and other gender-related issues in his latest USA Today article. As sports law historians will remember, there is some precedent on the issue of gender eligibility in sports - Renee Richards v. United States Tennis Association, 93 Misc.2d 713 (1977). In the case, plaintiff Richards prevailed and earned the right to compete as a female in professional tennis tournaments, including the U.S. Open.

Cam Update

Well, the verdict is in and the NCAA agreed with my earlier post that it should not punish the son because the father may have broken some rather serious rules. Not everyone is pleased. Gene Wojciechowski of ESPN writes in an article titled “NCAA spins fairytale fodder” that this has opened up “loophole chaos” and that “The NCAA, for all its countless, mind-boggling rules, is apparently useless when it comes to a father trying to sell his son.”

Come on, now. The NCAA is no slouch when it comes to enforcing its endless set of hypocritical regulations. But it simply found no evidence that either Cam Newton or anyone at Auburn knew anything about the alleged scheme or did anything wrong.

We still know precious little about what went down here. Supposedly, a pastor at a poor church in disrepair through a former player at Mississippi State offered to steer his son to that program in exchange for $180,000. The school didn’t bite. The son enrolled at Auburn, which was never asked to contribute to the ailing church, and he became the leading candidate for the Heisman while leading the team to the BCS Championship Game where he will earn Auburn millions of dollars. Now that’s a story.

I still say the NCAA did the right thing here. Amazingly. But why? Was it to follow the wisdom of Ezekiel—and me—about not punishing the child for the sins of the father? Or was it to protect the product which at this late date needs Auburn and the best player in the country in its showcase title game? Maybe Wojciechowski knows.

Should Bud Selig be Fired? *(by Marquette Law School)*

At the Adjunct Professor Blog, Mitchell Rubenstein (St. John's) rebukes the Marquette School of Law for retaining MLB Commissioner Selig as an Adjunct Professor. The Marquette press release is here. Prof. Rubenstein writes:

I think this is a total disgrace to law professors and am disappointed in Marquette Law School. No doubt Mr. Selig is an accomplished professional and no doubt that he can be an asset to any school by an occasional lecture about some of his experiences. But it is quite another thing to teach a class to students learning to be lawyers and to evaluate students, i.e., grade them. Law school is not business school and I am sorry to say that this appears to be a publicity stunt by Marquette Law School.

The position of an adjunct professor is certainly the most precarious at most law schools (other than that of the dean), so some angst at this hire is understandable. Adjunct professors -- practicing lawyers, typically, who join the faculty to teach one class (or two) -- serve at the pleasure of the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, without the security of tenure or a long-term contract. They are relatively poorly compensated (rarely, I would guess, earning their hourly billing rate for time spent), yet engage in heavy-lifting activities like writing exams and grading student papers. Yet because they also have full time jobs in practice, they miss out on many of the speakers, workshops, and other activities that add to the joy of law teaching. To the extent that Prof. Rubenstein's blog speaks for adjuncts, his chagrin at any reduction in the qualifications for such teachers is possible to understand.

Yet the degree of criticism here seems extreme. First, to the extent that the critique is based on Selig's lack of qualification to grade students, it seems that he will be co-teaching a class with full-time Professor Matt Mitten. My guess is that Prof. Mitten, certainly qualified to do so, will be doing most (if not all) of the actual grading in the course.

Prof. Rubenstein also objects to a non-lawyer teaching legal classes. My personal view on this is that diversity in instruction is beneficial to all kinds of students, including law students. While bar exam courses should probably be taught only by faculty with legal experience and education, upper level electives like Sports Law may give students a better educational experience if those with real industry experience are involved. Selig has supervised labor negotiations, imposed discipline under a CBA, and no doubt hired hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of legal services. Would there be any objection to an accountant teaching a class on accounting to JD students? Or an M.D. teaching a class on medicine for lawyers? In my view students can learn a lot from someone who has hired lawyers.

More on Cameron Newton

Isaac Newton’s Law of Gravitation holds that every massive particle of the universe attracts every other massive particle. To state it another way, or according to Cam Newton (no relation), “When God be blessin’, the devil be messin’.”

For perhaps the most gifted quarterback to come out of the NFL farm system in a decade, both of these principles mean that success breeds a flurry of rumor mongerers, two-bit accusers looking for their five minutes of fame, and former coaches with axes to grind all intent on bringing down the latest star in the mythically pristine world of college athletics. And one other unlikely culprit: the vaunted New York Times.

It was the Times that first published the attack piece on Maurice Clarett in the off season after Clarett helped Ohio State win the National Championship. It was this article that snowballed into the NCAA investigation, culminating in Clarett’s suspension from Buckeyes football, his need to try to enter the NFL early, and his ultimate downfall. In that article, the Times was outraged that freshman Clarett was allowed to retake a midterm when his African American history professor insisted that he do more than skate through classes without learning the material.

Six months ago, the Times wrote no less than three major articles exploring whether Kentucky basketballer and first round draft pick Eric Bledsoe had really deserved a good grade in his Birmingham, Alabama high school Algebra II class. This article also prompted an NCAA investigation as well as one conducted and paid for by the Birmingham School Board, both of which cleared Bledsoe of any shenanigans.

Now the New York Times claims “credit,” along with ESPN, for “breaking” the Cam Newton story in which, so far, no one has proven anything resembling the alleged impropriety had actually happened. Indeed, the Times has already been taken to task for reporting that one of the key whistleblowers in the case had talked to one of the accused principals when at least one of the parties now denies that took place.

I don’t know what happened to cause Newton, Cam not Isaac, to attend Auburn as opposed to Mississippi State. I do know the story reported by the Times makes no logical sense though I recognize people sometimes act illogically against their best interests. Mainly, I am troubled by an institution like the New York Times spending its resources and energy in trying to out college athletes, kids really, toiling in a system we all know to be the pinnacle of hypocrisy.