Sports Law: Advanced Practices, Skills, and Documents explores many of the opportunities for sports law practice in representing (i) colleges and universities with respect to amateur sports, and (ii) the management of professional sports teams (i.e., not the players or their union). Amateur topics will include NCAA and Title IX Compliance work, contracts with athletic directors and coaches, NCAA, investigations, and student athlete eligibility issues. Professional topics will include sports franchise acquisition, collective bargaining with a players' association, and contracts with managers and coaches, immigration matters, player safety issues, grievance proceedings, drug testing programs, and agent compliance work. The course will include a substantial skills component focused on problem-solving, negotiation, document drafting, and helping sports industry clients navigate complex regulatory schemes.
Curriculum
The Moorad Sports Law Center prepares students for legal careers in amateur and professional sports through rigorous academic study, innovative programs, internship opportunities, scholarship, and research.
Designed for personalization, the program allows students to focus their studies on an array of specialty areas. Students interested in the field are encouraged to pursue electives that intersect with Sports Law, including Antitrust Law, Business Associations, Constitutional Law II, Disability Law, Education Law, Federal Income Taxation of Individuals, Intellectual Property Law, and Labor Law.
Specific sports law offerings at Villanova University School of Law include:
From the perspective of both the agent side and the management side of professional sports, this course will provide students with advanced insights and analyses of both historical and current issues in Sports Law. While the course will make references to traditional, introductory concepts in sports law -- the Baseball Antitrust Exemption, core cases leading to free agency in all major sports, the non-statutory labor exemption and its impact on sports unions and collective bargaining, etc.-- it will concurrentl concurrently take a fresh look at issues that are writing new chapters in sports law in real time. For example, in the past couple of years Sports Law has changed course with (1) a historic decision against the NFL involving the Patriots and Tom Brady, (2) transcendent actions by Colin Kaepernick and other athletes seeking social change, (3) new legalities regarding concussion treatment and protocol among professional sports, (4) evolving attitudes of sports league and organizations towards gambling and marijuana. The course will provide students real-life examples of how current issues (which issues may change each time the course is offered) impact administration and risk management of players and teams. Course materials will be supplemented by my Sports Illustrated columns and ESPN media broadcasts.
