Judge: NIL rules violate antitrust law

A federal judge on Friday barred the NCAA from enforcing its rules prohibiting name, image and likeness compensation from being used to entice recruits, granting a request for a preliminary injunction from the states of Tennessee and Virginia and dealing another blow to the association’s ability to govern college sports and more than 500,000 athletes.

The ruling by U.S. District Judge Clifton Corker in the Eastern District of Tennessee undercuts what has been a fundamental principle of the NCAA’s model of amateurism for decades: Third parties cannot pay recruits to attend a particular school.

Corker wrote that the NCAA’s stance likely violates antitrust law with Congress so far unwilling to give the association an antitrust exemption. The judge said athletes with a limited window are harmed irreparably by not being able to know their true value before committing to a school.

“The NCAA fails to show how such relief will cause any harm that outweighs the irreparable harm that student-athletes will face in the absence of an injunction,” Corker wrote.

The NCAA said it would review the ruling and will talk with its member schools about possible policy changes. But the NCAA said that turning rules supported by members “upside down” will only make an already chaotic situation worse and lessen protections keeping athletes from being exploited.

“An endless patchwork of state laws and court opinions make clear partnering with Congress is necessary to provide stability for the future of all college athletes,” the NCAA said in its statement on the same day NCAA President Charlie Baker was on Capitol Hill.