Labor Relations in European Sport Flashcards
Why is a system of collective bargaining important within US?
The system of collective bargaining has had a very significant impact on the US professional industry. Unionisation of players has diminished the importance and significance of a uniform player agreement promulgated by the teams or the league itself.
Explain the reserve clause system
The rule placed obligation upon clubs within the same league prohibiting them from employing or negotiating with players reserve to another club.
The reserve clause would give the club the exclusive right to reserve a player, unilaterally to prolong his contract upon expiry. The player could not oppose the clause.
What is a free agent?
Free agents are player who upon expiry of their contract unrestrictedly can negotiate and sign a contract with a new club.
What is the option clause?
The option clause only gave the club the right to renew the contract for one additional year.
What is the Rozelle rule?
A inter-league rule which required that any club signing a free agent ought to compensate the original employer. Payment could consist of transfer of future drafts rights, money etc.
What is the tampering rule?
A rule which prohibits other teams from negotiating with or making an offer to a player whose rights are held by another club.
What is the right of first refusal?
The right of first refusal allowed a player’s prior team to match any offers made to a free agents and thereby retain the player’s services.
If the team chose not to match, the player could sign with a new team, but the new team would still have to compensate, cf. the Rozelle rule.
What is the FIFA license rules?
Rules according to which a player only is entitled to play, when his club is in possession of his player license.
What is the draft system?
The draft system is a system used to allocate new players - foreign or domestic - from college or high school or other existing teams.
Designed to protect competitive balance.
The core of the system provides the club with the best record in the previous season with the disadvantage or drafting last.
Once a club has drafted a player, its right to contract with him is exclusive.
The duration of the club’s rights varies among leagues.
What is the salary cap or luxury taxes?
A restriction on player salaries penalising any club that spends more than the amount allowed for salaries.
The system has been sought to be circumvented by using sign-on bonuses etc.
What is the Amnesty Cause?
A rule allowing a team to waive one player within having their salary count towards the cap or pay a luxury tax.
What was the 3+2 rule?
A rule after which the number of players from other European member states could not be limited to less than 3 players per team + 2 assimilated players who had played for 5 years in the country concerned, including 3 years in a youth team.
Struck down by the Bosman case.
Explain the Homegrown Players rule
A player rule which aimed to encourage the local training of young players and fix a minimum of homegrown players in a squad limited to 25.
A minimum of 8 homegrown players is required. To obligation to field the players.
A homegrown player is a player who had been trained by the club or by another club in the same national association for at least 3 years between age 15-21. Up to half of the locally trained players had to come from the club itself.
Explain the Federal Baseball case
Owing the the case, baseball has been able to remain immune from legal intervention on the basis of anti-trust.
The case was between two competition baseball leagues. Federal Baseball League alleged that the other league by enforcing their reserve clauses prevented the Federal League from obtaining quality players.
The Court did not assess the merits of the case since the activities of organised baseball did not fall within the scope of the Sherman Act.
The Toolson case followed the Federal Baseball case.
Explain the Curt Flood case
Curt Flood was traded to another clubs without any prior consolation and against his wishes. The Supreme Court affirmed the anti-trust exemption on baseball and was fully aware of the inconsistencies with other sports.
However, this was a job of the Congress - not the Court.
What was the Curt Flood Act?
The Act removed exemptions and give the baseball players the rights to enjoy the same rights under anti-trust laws as other players.
However, the Curt Flood Act only provided extension of the anti-trust laws to the narrow area of activity directly relation to or affecting the employment of MLB players.
Did the Baseball exemption also relate to other sports?
No, the Supreme Court made it clear that it was a special exemption - not a general standard.
Explain the Radovich v. NFL case
A case regarding NFL and anti-trust, where the Court stressed that no other team sport but baseball could legitimately have relied on the anti-trust exemption in Federal Baseball and Toolson.
Which 3 federal status make up the statutory exemption of the anti-trust laws?
The Clayton Act
The Norris - La Guardia Act
The National Labor Relation Act (NLRA)
Explain the Clayton Act?
Act restricting the ability of courts to apply the Sherman Act anti-competition prescription against union organising activities. Labor of humans is beyond the reach of anti-trust law.
Explain the Norris - La Guardia Act
Precluded federal courts from issuing injunctions in labor disputes, except in cases involving unlawful destruction of property.
Explain the NLRA?
The Act generally extracts a duty on both employees and unions to bargain in good faith over certain mandatory subjects in peaceful collective bargaining rather than resorting to government interference to settle the dispute.
Explain the Mackey case and the Mackey test
8 union sponsored players challenged the Rozelle rule.
NFLPA said that the rule had been part of the CBA and was therefore exempt from anti-trust attacks.
The Court rule that the statutory exemption only applied to protect union activity.
The Mackey test for application of the non-statutory exemption.
1. The restraint of trade primarily affected only the parties.
2. Federal labor policy would prevail only where the agreement sought to be exempted concerned a mandatory subject of CBA
3. Policy favouring CBA would pre-empt anti-trust application only where the agreement sought to be exempted was the products of the arm-s length bargaining.
The court did not find the third element to appear.
Does the non-statutory exemption survive the expiration of a bargaining agreement?
Bridgeman v. NBA - NO
Powell v. NFL - When the player-team relationship was governed by NRLA it would survive impasse as long as the players were represented by the Union.
McNeal case - No allowance for the NFL to invoke the non-statutory labor exemption as a defence.
Brown case - the exemption continues as long as the parties have a bargaining relationship.
What did the Bosman case render regarding nationality clauses?
The case reaffirmed that rules limiting the number of players from other member states whom a club could play in a match were or a discriminatory nature and thus rendered inapplicable with art. 45 TFEU.
