Saturday, July 18, 2009

Important Story That I Can't Get Through

Will somebody in law school or with more patience than me please read this story and give me a summary?

"Antitrust Case Could Be Armageddon" by Lester Munson

Sounds important, right?
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5 comments:

  1. Steve NoffkeJuly 19, 2009 at 11:48 PM

    I read the article before you posted it. There's a lot legal junk and the writer didn't help by putting it into simple terms for the readers. It seems really important and if the NFL wins it basically means, higher prices for everything and players/coaches get less and can't move. So the big winners....the OWNERS! Horay, I will now staple my head to the desk. I wouldn't mind seeing the end of free agency though. I don't know how I feel, I'm sure I'll post more later.

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  2. Mark FodorJuly 20, 2009 at 12:29 AM

    Oh, that's what sports needs. More power for the owners! Great!

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  3. RyanJuly 21, 2009 at 5:07 PM

    Yeah, while I am not an "expert" on anti-trust law by any means, basically if the NFL wins, which I doubt it will even though this article talks doom and gloom, it will basically be saying that the NFL is a sole entity, and their teams are just another department, or the "Single entity" theory. I.E. the Bears would be like the accounting department, Steelers the legal, etc. And the NFL would just be the name of the company. Anti-trust law says that you cannot restrain trade basically by conspiracy to do so or whatever. The idea behind the Sherman Act (which created anti-trust laws) was to promote competition.

    However, if the NFL is deemed a single entity, than teams won't compete with others for lower prices. They won't compete with others for signing top players, or trying to put the best team out there, simply b/c the money will be distributed evenly throughout the league. The reason for this is b/c you cannot restrain trade in your own company b/c in the end its the same company i.e. a single entity (hope that makes sense).

    However, if the Supreme Court says, as they should say, that each of the 32 franchises are businesses, each has local media contracts which they get to keep themselves. Each team tries to put the best product out on the field to bring in more money for themselves, there is a laundry list of these things, than the teams will continue to compete. Thus, lower ticket prices b/c they are in competition. There will be higher salaries, as teams compete to put the best product on the field, in order to bring in more revenue. I don't see the NFL winning, although, the NFL clearly was waiting for a time like this to try to gain more power. Even so, Anti-trust law generally would rather favor lower prices for consumers than producers, and I just don't see how the Supreme Court could justify this interpretation. But, the NFL does have some great lawyers, I guess we'll see.

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  4. RyanJuly 21, 2009 at 7:44 PM

    In case it wasn't clear, in a single entity the players would be like employees at certain departments, the teams would be the departments, and the league would be the company. Thus, a company can raise and lower salaries as they choose, just like any other salary structure. Whereas they wouldn't be able to do that due to competition for players and teams in the current league.

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  5. Mark FodorJuly 22, 2009 at 5:05 PM

    Holy crap, that was a good explanation. Thank you, sir.

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