News Tip: NFL Faces Difficult Fight in Clarett Case
Duke sports law expert Paul Haagen says former Ohio State football player Maurice Clarett has a strong antitrust case to challenge the existing NFL eligibility rule
Tuesday, September 23, 2003
The National Football League will have a difficult time preventing former Ohio State football player Maurice Clarett from entering the NFL draft earlier than its current rule allows, says a Duke University legal expert.
On Tuesday, Clarett sued the NFL, asking a judge to throw out a league rule that prevents players from entering the draft until they have been out of high school for three years. Under the existing rule, Clarett would not be eligible for the NFL draft until 2005, but he is seeking to be eligible for the 2004 draft.
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."
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.
"Perhaps the greater impact will be to increase the belief among college athletes that the norm and expectation is to exit early for the pros. It may increase the perverse belief among high level Division I scholarship athletes that only our failures graduate."
Haagen can be reached for additional comment at (919) 613-7088 or by e-mail.
