Duck Season

Greg at Begging to Differ thinks that Maurice Clarett has a good chance of winning his lawsuit against the National Football league. Clarett had sued the NFL for violating antitrust laws because of their rule that players are not eligible to be drafted and play until three years after their high school graduation. Greg quotes Duke law professor Paul Haagen on the legal merits of the case:

Duke law professor Paul Haagen, whose principal academic interests are contracts, legal history and sports law, says Clarett has a strong antitrust case against the NFL. "In the United States, any attempt by competitors to restrain competition in the labor market is regarded by the courts with great suspicion. Unless the restraint falls under a limited number of narrow exceptions, it will be treated as a violation of the antitrust laws."

For the NFL to succeed in this case, "it will need to demonstrate either that its rule falls within the Rule of Reason, and in fact enhances competition, or that it is incorporated by reference in the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the league and the Players' Association and thus is protected by the non-statutory labor exemption to the antitrust laws," says Haagen, a faculty member in Duke Law School's Center for Sports Law & Policy. "It will be a difficult argument for the league to sustain."

Greg admits that he knows little about antitrust law, and neither do I, so I'll quote Greg Easterbrook, a.k.a. Tuesday morning Quarterback, for a, um, differing view:

If the NFL starts bringing in teenagers, what will happen is exactly what's happened to pro basketball. Quality of play -- by far the most important aspect of NFL popularity -- will spiral downward. Immature kids will boast and strut for the cameras but refuse to listen to coaches, turning off the paying customers who earn far less than the boasting kids. Experienced veterans who know what they're doing will be thrown overboard for sulking teenagers who end up busts, accelerating the decline in quality of play. Since football requires more cooperation than any sport, and teenagers are by nature uncooperative, fumbles, interceptions and blown plays will increase until every team looks like the Arizona Cardinals. The goose who lays the golden eggs will be tossed into the Crock Pot.

And please don't tell me the league's anti-teenager rule is a conspiracy to stop young African-Americans from becoming rich. If black adolescents are handed huge NFL contracts, veteran players will be waived to free up the funds, and the majority of veteran NFL players are black. (The inevitable release of veteran players is the reason the NFL Players Association opposes allowing teenagers in.) Net monies paid to African-American athletes would remain the same in the early years of a teenagers-allowed system -- though payments would be shifted downward from older players who have learned to be serious about their lives and families, to teenagers who would blow the money. In the latter years of a teenagers-allowed system, net monies paid to black NFL athletes would decline, as the cooking of the golden goose causes the NFL to fall into the same downward spiral the NBA is currently in. Note that the NBA contract top scale, which is earned almost exclusively by African-Americans, has gone down since the league started letting teenagers in.


Also, please don't tell me there is some kind of constitutional right to play professional football at age 19. Many occupations impose age minimums -- you don't run across a lot of 19-year-old police officers or 19-year-old airline pilots. Courts uphold such minimums if they are reasonably related to professional requirements. The reasonable relationship here is that quality of play is the NFL's golden goose, and putting kids on the field will clobber quality. (Emphasis added)

I still think that, if there is no settlement, then the NFL will lose, not because of the merits of the case (about which I know little), but because the NFL has a very bad record as a defendant in lawsuits. The NFL knows this, so there's a chance that the case will be settled. (This is according to two local football reporters on the radio.) One option include holding a special supplemental draft for Clarett. (In a supplemental draft, any team can draft Clarett in a particular round in exchange for the corresponding pick in next year's draft. So if, for example, the Patriots take Clarett in the third round in the supplemental draft, they lose their third round pick next year.) It is unclear on whether the rule would stand after this potential settlement.

Also, Haagen is probably wrong on this:

If the NFL can no longer enforce its eligibility rule, or if it voluntarily agrees to abandon the rule, it is difficult to predict what effect it may have on college football, Haagen says. "Because of the nature of the sport, it is very difficult for younger players, even very skilled younger players, to compete at the NFL level. It is likely that relatively few would in fact be drafted early."

NFL teams have no problems right now with taking players who are not ready to play in their first and second years (see: Koren Robinson, Plaxico Burress). Usually, teams take players who can play right now rather than a project player who might be good in a few years (because the head coach might be fired by then), but they do make exceptions for most quarterbacks and the top level talent, and these will likely be the players who will leave college early if the NFL loses.