The law firm Gibson Dunn recently filed an Amicus Brief on behalf of the Players Associations of the NFL, NBA, WNBA, National Women’s Soccer League, and the Collegiate Association supporting college players in their appeal challenging the NCAA’s restrictions on education-related benefits above the cost of attendance.
The firm, which was represented by DC partners Andrew Tulumello, Kristen Limarzi and associate Arianna Scavetti, noted the following “key points:”
- The brief unites the nation’s most prominent men’s and women’s Players Associations in defense of college athletes. These professional athletes are standing up against an unfair and illegal system that deprives college athletes of the right to monetize their unique talents that belongs to every other American. The brief strikes a blow against NCAA rules that “demand that college athletes sacrifice their minds and bodies for their schools and for their love of the game while every penny of economic benefit flows to someone else” and calls upon the Supreme Court to reject the rules as “anathema to modern antitrust law and deeply rooted American values.”
- The brief eviscerates “amateurism” as a rationale for denying college athletes enhanced educational benefits, decrying as “specious” the NCAA’s claim that amateurism is an essential and defining feature of college sports. “[N]o one could sincerely believe that Alabama versus Auburn at Bryant-Denny Stadium in November will suddenly become indistinguishable from an NFL game because a few players received a musical instrument or a graduate school scholarship. Nor would an upset win by a 16th seed or a Cinderella run during March Madness become indistinguishable from NBA games because a basketball player was promised a future internship with his or her conference or school.” “[C]ollege sports are differentiated from professional sports because the athletes are students—not because they are uncompensated.”
- The Players Associations reject the NCAA’s claims that amateurism supports the NCAA’ educational mission, underscoring that the NCAA’s amateurism rules impair college athletes’ educational and entrepreneurial opportunities and that the NCAA itself has admitted that many athletes would stay in school longer if its rules were lifted. “Antitrust doctrine has gone topsy-turvy when the amateurism rationale for price-fixing also works to the detriment of students’ academic lives.”
- These professional athletes defend the interests of their college brothers and sisters who will not advance to professional sports, noting that only a very small percentage of draft-eligible athletes are ultimately selected. “Depriving athletes of compensation while in college is particularly problematic because, for most athletes, college sports provide their only opportunity in life to monetize their athletic talents.”
- The brief emphasizes that lifting the NCAA’s amateurism rules will benefit female athletes and pushes back against the NCAA’s argument that permitting competition will harm women’s sports as “old-fashioned stereotyping.” “Permitting, if not requiring pursuant to Title IX, colleges to compensate female athletes will incentivize them to invest in women’s sports and to create additional avenues for continued growth.”
- The brief points out that amateurism has made arbitrariness “part of the NCAA’s DNA.” It describes amateurism as “meaningless” and “malleable,” observing that colleges are free to spend millions of dollars on luxurious athletic facilities and salaries for administrators and coaches, but cannot offer college athletes academic incentives, graduate scholarships, or post-eligibility internships.
- The Players Associations call upon the Supreme Court to affirm the lower courts’ decisions lifting the NCAA’s artificial caps on education-related benefits and, in doing so, to “permit colleges to compete with books instead of buildings and to reward athletes instead of administrators.”
