What: 2010 Tulane Law School National Baseball Arbitration Competition

When: January 22-24, 2010

Where: Tulane University Law School. Map.

The Tulane Law School Sports Law Society has been busy inviting law schools to compete in the 2010 Tulane Law School National Baseball Arbitration Competition. I received an email invite last week, asking if my school (University of Florida Levin College of Law) would be interested in attending.

The Baseball Arbitration Competition is a simulated salary arbitration competition modeled closely on the salary arbitration procedures used by Major League Baseball.  Each team will represent either the assigned player for that round or the team for which that player plays. The goal of each round is to determine the salary for that player for the upcoming season by persuading the arbitrator(s) that the position advocated for is more appropriate.

The competition assumes that each party has previously submitted their final offer, and that good faith negotiations have concluded.  Each problem will include these final offers; the competitors’ objective is to persuade the independent arbitrator, through both a written submission and through oral arguments, that the offer tendered by their client is the most appropriate compensation for that player.  Players used for this competition will, barring unforeseen circumstances, be actual Major League Baseball players eligible for salary arbitration in that year.

The deadline for registration is 5:00 p.m. on December 15.

Cost: $150 per team (2-3 people per team. Only 2 people may participate in any single round).  Schools may bring up to 2 teams.  Click here to register.

Competition Website | Competition Rules

Wow, that was a long paragraph.  But after almost 2 1/2 years of law school, I can now confidently say that I will graduate with a better understanding of the best practices in representing talent, and that I will have an edge over my counterparts who never put in the 3 years to attain a J.D.  I did not write that statement with the intention of denigrating anyone’s intellectual capacity, and there are plenty of amazing sports agents who have had tremendous success in scrupulously representing their clients.  However, I do believe that there is a lot to gain by going to law school, especially in the realm of learning how to effectively negotiate (which really cannot be learned by just reading a book).

There are a lot more sports agents (A LOT MORE) than there are General Managers in their respective sports.  While not every agent has had the proper education necessary to effectively negotiate on behalf of his client, you better believe that every GM knows every trick in the book, whether it be from formal education or years and years of experience.  Mark Warkentien, VP of Basketball Operations for the Denver Nuggets, is one of those expert negotiators.  During Summer, he spent a week at Harvard Law School in order to enlarge his arsenal of negotiation tools, and shared some of his wisdom with Ian Thomsen of SI.  Some important points he talks about are:

• The need to know what your counterpart is going to say before you sit down at the negotiating table.
• Find points of agreement before starting the negotiation.
• Make your counterpart justify his interests and positions.
• Face-to-face negotiations beat phone/email/fax conversations.
• Showing emotion often does not help you in progressing your position.
• Be flexible in negotiations.
• Don’t talk down to your counterpart.
• Never use the word “but”.

I have learned all of those bullet points, minus the very last one.  However, it is definitely an interested point, and one that I may take into consideration when altering my own negotiating style.  This is how Warkentien describes Harvard Law School’s justification for scrapping the word “but” from negotiations:

“When you say, ‘I hear what you’re telling me, but …’ what you’re really saying is, ‘Go to hell.’ That word — ‘but’ — comes across as if everything the other guy has just said doesn’t matter.”

As a side note, I will be speaking at Barry University School of Law exactly a week from today.  If you are in Orlando, please join the discussion next Monday at 12 p.m.  Contact Thomas M. Schoendorf for more information.

Today there are almost 7 billion people in the world. When I was a kid, there were 5 billion.  It’s hard to keep up.

In Windsor, Ontario, a 17-year-old kid named Taylor Hall registered 90 points in 63 games in the Ontario Hockey League. You will see a kid named Cam Fowler next year in the World Junior Championships.  Next June, teams will be falling all over themselves to sign Kirill Kabanov of Moscow, Russia in the next NHL Draft.

Believe me, there’s genius everywhere but until they turn pro, it’s like popcorn in the pan – some pop, some don’t. Now I’m the guy you don’t usually see. I’m the one behind the scenes. My name is Scott Deady, and I’m the sports agent.

Most of you reading this probably picked up the Jerry Maguire rip by the end of the second sentence. If you could tell by the end of the first, I can’t decide if I’m impressed or if I just feel bad for you. After the release of the film Jerry Maguire, it seemed as though every third person’s goal was to work in the sports industry – most people specifically wanting to be the guy yelling, “Show me the money!” And who wouldn’t want to work in sports after seeing Jerry work the hotel lobby like he did? It painted a picture where the life of an agent was sexier than that of the professional athlete himself. But the truth is that life as a sports agent, while certainly providing its share of perks, isn’t all that the film makes it out to be. Long hours, consistent rejection, and often feeling like nothing more than a babysitter all come with the territory. However these issues are rarely understood by those not working directly in the sports industry. That’s what I’m here for – to show you what life as a sports agent is really like.

Recently, I accepted a position with a sports agency as the Director of a newly formed hockey division. Before I came on board, the agency represented players from both the NFL and CFL, as well as a handful of other athletes. My company was looking to venture into another sport, and ice hockey interested them. That’s where I came in. As the Director of the Hockey Division, my duties include scouting and recruiting throughout Russia and North America, as well as procuring performance contracts and endorsement deals for, and handling the personal issues of, our hockey clients.

Now you might ask how a 25-year-old, with no real world experience, secures a position directing a division of a sports agency that already represents talent at the highest professional level. To be honest, I’d say it was a combination of about 75% hard work and careful planning mixed in with around 25% good timing. Or maybe it was more like 50/50 hard work and just being lucky…feel free to make your own assessment. But regardless of my “winning formula,” my path to where I am today all began while growing up playing club hockey in the suburbs of Chicago, Illinois.

During my senior year of high school, my club team – the Downers Grove Huskies – competed in an annual international tournament known as the Tretiak Cup. For the two weeks the visiting foreign teams spent in the United States, my family agreed to host two Russian players from the Red Army Hockey Club in our home. The two assigned to us were Dmitry Shitikov (current forward for Moscow Dynamo of the Kontinental Hockey League) and Sergei Shirokov (drafted at #163 overall by the Vancouver Canucks in 2006 and the most recent Russian player to enter the heated NHL-KHL battle over players’ contract rights, and pictured, right). After getting to know and becoming very close with Sergei and Dima (Dima is a common Russian nickname for Dmitry), I decided that I wanted nothing more than to represent professional hockey players, specifically desiring to help underprivileged Russian players reach the ultimate goal of the NHL. Now that I knew where I wanted my life to go, I needed a plan to help get me there.

After high school, I went on to play hockey for Ohio University, where I would graduate in 2006 with a Bachelor’s Degree in Communication. While at OU, I studied Russian for three years and in the summer of 2005 I obtained a position in the prestigious internship program of IMG at their home office in Cleveland, Ohio. Throughout the years, I kept in contact with my Russian friends and upon graduation from OU, I traveled to Moscow for two weeks to visit them. By that time, I had committed to law school at Ohio Northern University after turning down an offer from Marquette University’s College of Law – one of the top institutions for those pursuing a career in sports law.  While ONU didn’t have a reputation as being a top law school, they were offering me substantial scholarship money. In retrospect, the decision to attend Northern ended up being possibly the best decision of my life – the founder of my firm was also an ONU Law graduate and last Fall a few of my now partners came to our campus to speak. Fortunately, I attended the Friday afternoon presentation and afterwards I approached the group, telling my story and explaining my basic career plan. They seemed intrigued and so I remained in contact with them through my third year of law school. Eventually I asked if we could meet at their home office to discuss the viability of a hockey division, and a week before graduation I flew out to California to present the extensive 40-page business plan I had developed over the previous six months. After several days of meetings, I was offered, and I eagerly accepted, my current position.

Now before making the connection with my current firm, I had sent my resume to practically every agent certified by the NHLPA and PHPA (Professional Hockey Players’ Association) looking for an opportunity to show what I could do.  The overall response from my efforts was discouraging at best, and I was beginning to realize that I might have to do this on my own. I read some books written by and about sports agents looking for any insight as to what the best route to success was. Unfortunately, most of those out there give only a brief glance at how the agent got his start. But what I really craved was an understanding of the day-to-day challenges facing an agent new to the industry. I wanted to know exactly what I was about to face and what I needed to do to really make it in such a competitive environment. The idea of this column is to give readers precisely what I was looking for – a glimpse into my daily life as a new sports agent. I’ll be posting new entries weekly and by reading, you can follow me from the beginning – sharing both the ups and downs in my pursuit to make a big splash in the hockey community.

While my company certainly provides me with the structural and financial support that many newcomers to the sports business community don’t have, there are still innumerable obstacles left to be overcome. Hopefully by reading this column, you’ll be able to replicate some of my moves that work, steer away from decisions that don’t, and better set yourself up for success in an extremely competitive industry. Even if not pursuing a career in sports, getting a peak behind the scenes can shed light on a lot of issues on the field or ice that otherwise might go unnoticed or be misunderstood. And who knows – by authoring this maybe I’ll learn a thing or two about myself as well.

School is about to start back up across the nation, which means that many law schools will start to announce their Sports Law Symposiums for the Fall and Spring semesters.  Yesterday, I received an email about Marquette University’s 2009 Conference.  Marquette is home of the National Sports Law Institute, one of, if not the, most respected Sports Law programs in the United States.  Here are the details:

What: Conference on The Evolution of Sports Law and Business from the 20th to the 21st Century

When: Friday, October 23, 2009 (8:30 am to 5:30 pm)

Where: The Alumni Memorial Union on the Marquette’s campus

Cost: Register here.  General admission = $150.  Members of the National Sports Law Institute = $99.  Marquette University Law School alumni = $75.  Members of the Sports & Entertainment Law Section of the State Bar of Wisconsin = $110.  Marquette University students and faculty = FREE.  Law students from any other law school = $50.

Panels & Participants:

High School Sports
Moderator:

• Matt Parlow, Associate Professor of Law, Marquette University Law School, Milwaukee, WI

Panelists:

• John S. Black, General Counsel, National Federation of State High School Associations, Indianapolis, IN
• Doug Chickering, WIAA Director Emeritus, Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association, Stevens Point, WI
• Janis K. Doleschal, Retired Commissioner for Sports and Athletics, Milwaukee Public Schools, and Sports Law Consultant, Law Offices of Jacques Mann & Start Playing Safe, Milwaukee, WI

Gender Equity, Torts and Sports Officiating Law
Moderator:

• William Miller (L’96), Assistant Professor, Health, Exercise Science & Sport Management, University of Wisconsin – Parkside, Kenosha, WI

Panelists:

• Paul Anderson (L’95), Associate Director, National Sports Law Institute and Adjunct Professor of Law, Marquette University Law School, Milwaukee, WI
• Timothy Davis, John W. & Ruth H. Turnage Professor of Law, Wake Forest University School of Law, Winston-Salem, NC
• Barry Mano, President, National Association of Sports Officials, Racine, WI

College Sports
Moderator:

• Steve Cottingham, Director of Athletics, Marquette University, Milwaukee, WI

Panelists:

• Elsa Kircher Cole, Vice President of Legal Affairs/General Counsel, National Collegiate Athletic Association, Indianapolis, IN
• Shawn Eichorst (L’95), Executive Associate Athletic Director, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI
• C. Peter Goplerud, Dean and Professor of Law, Florida Coastal School of Law, Jacksonville, FL
• Kathryn Statz (L’00), Associate Athletic Director, Varsity Sports, DePaul University, Chicago, IL

Professional Sports
Part One:
Moderator:

• Casey Coffman, Chief Operating Officer, Hicks Sports Group LLC, and Executive Vice President, Hicks Holdings LLC, Dallas, TX

Panelists:

• Mary K. Braza, Partner, Chair, Sports Industry Team, and Member, Management Committee, Foley & Lardner LLP, Milwaukee, WI
• Jim McKeown, Partner, Chair, Antitrust Practice Group, Foley & Lardner LLP, Milwaukee, WI
• Phoebe Williams (L’81), Associate Professor of Law, Marquette University Law School, Milwaukee, WI

Part Two:
Moderator:

• Matthew Mitten, Professor of Law and Director, National Sports Law Institute of Marquette University Law School, Milwaukee, WI, and Member, Court of Arbitration for Sport, Lausanne, Switzerland

• Martin J. Greenberg (L’71), Managing Partner, Greenberg & Hoeschen, LLC, Chair of the Board, Wisconsin Sports Foundation, and Member, Southeast Wisconsin Professional Baseball Park District, Milwaukee, WI
• J. Gordon Hylton, Professor of Law, Marquette University Law School, Milwaukee, WI, and Visiting Professor of Law, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA
• Irwin P. Raij, Partner, Regulatory Industries Department, Member, Public Affairs and Real Estate Practices, and Vice Chair, Sports Industry Team, Foley & Lardner, Washington, D.C.

Olympic/International Sports
Moderator:

• John P. Collins, Partner, Collins & Collins, Chicago, IL

Panelists:

• Gary Johansen, Associate General Counsel, NGB and Athlete Affairs, United States Olympic Committee, Colorado Springs, CO
• Richard McLaren, Professor of Law, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada, Counsel to McKenzie Lake Lawyers LLP, and Member, Court of Arbitration for Sport, Lausanne, Switzerland
• James Nafziger, Visiting Boden Professor, Marquette University Law School, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and Thomas B. Stoel Professor of Law and Director, International Law Programs, Willamette University College of Law, Salem, OR
• Michael Straubel (L’82), Associate Professor of Law and Director, Sports Law Clinic, Valparaiso University School of Law, Valparaiso, IN

Basketball

• Worldwide Wes: A name I have not heard in quite some time [Surprise! William Wesley, aka Worldwide Wes, is at the Center of a Recruiting/Sneaker Controversy].
• Did you know that it’s run by a major Coach Agent? [Warren LeGarie: The Man Behind Vegas Summer League]
• I love that Tellem always makes time for this [NBA Stars to Play for Peace at Youth Clinic].

Baseball

• Thoughts? I don’t like the idea [Time to End the Draft System?].

Football

• Hopefully this is not what the UFL is looking forward to a few years down the line [AFL heading for bankruptcy?].

Sports Business

• Fantasy Sports 2.0 [FanDuel turns fantasy sports betting into a social game].
• After reading this article, all I could think about is how much Chinese companies like Houston Rockets players.  Will that change if Yao doesn’t return? [The Future Of Endorsements]

Sports Agents

• “The jockey agent is more like a theatrical agent.” [Lodi roots key to top jockey agent Mullica's success]

Contract Negotiation

• It still boggles my mind that the NFLPA does not complain THAT MUCH about the Franchise Tag [Quirky Sports Contracts].

For the current Internship Program, Justin Herzig (our HR Director) received over 250 intern applications.  Some were thrown away after reading a couple of lines of the cover letter, but most applicants actually seemed extremely qualified for the limited number of spots available.  Do you need to have a law degree, MBA, or internship to break into this industry?  Read Jack Bechta’s story…the answer is no.  But it surely does help to at least have an internship.  Bechta is a part of a very small minority of people who can succeed in this very difficult profession by printing a few business cards and starting up a company with absolutely no experience.

Bechta mentions that there are several agents with a huge client list that never attended law school.  My response is that an agent is not graded by his client list.  There are also many players who end up suing their agent or leaving the agent because of poor execution of his job.  When I first started law school, I wondered myself why so many people said that it was so important for a person to attend law school in order to be an agent.  Criminal law, Torts, Property, Civil Procedure…yeah they may all come in handy, but probably not.  Then came Contracts, Corporations, Business Organizations, Intellectual Property…now it all makes sense.  The knowledge I have after going to law school coupled with the experience I continue to gain with my own clients makes me a better agent every day.

There is also going the route of Bechta and keeping an attorney on retainer for your firm.  I still think that if given the opportunity, go to law school.  Players like having a one-stop shop for all their needs (that’s why CAA, WMG, etc. continue to dominate).  I think that they also want an agent who can wear more than one hat.  To bring a personal knowledge of the law to every negotiation and not have to rely on another person seems to bring some extra value to the table.

As far as grad school for some sort of Sports Management MBA is concerned, I am not completely sold.  If you go that route, I think you should definitely heed Bechta’s advice.  Look at who the professors are and the subjects being taught before you spend all that money.

I can’t disagree with Bechta when he says that overall the 2 most important qualities for success in this industry are:

1. a competitive nature
2. determination

Along with that, I will add a third quality: 3) innovation.  There are so many agents out there going after the same clients, giving the same pitch, and providing the same services.  Do something to make yourself stand out.  Sorry, I already created SportsAgentBlog.com, so making a blog about the sports agent world will not really separate you.  Spend some time thinking about what you can do to make yourself a thing of value.  I promise that the time taken will be well worth it.

The National Sports Law Institute of Marquette University Law School announces the creation of the National Sports Law Student Writing Competition.  The goal of this annual competition is to encourage law student scholarship on current topics in sports law.  The winner of the competition will receive complimentary registration for the National Sports Law Institute’s annual fall conference on Friday, October 23, 2009, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and an offer to publish their article in the Fall 2009 issue of the Marquette Sports Law Review.

ELIGIBILITY: Any law student in good standing who is currently attending an accredited law school within the United States and its territories may enter the competition.  All submissions must be original and unpublished.  Submissions may be any original and unpublished student work.  For example, this could include papers written for a law school course or unpublished student comments written as a membership requirement for a law journal or review.

DEADLINE: Entries must be received by Friday, July 17, 2009.

2009 COMPETITION GUIDELINES:

1. Submissions to the 2009 competition must focus on some aspect of Labor and Employment Law within the sports industry on the national or international level.
2. Submissions must follow the Marquette Sports Law Review’s Guidelines for Authors found online at http://law.marquette.edu/cgi-bin/site.pl?2130&pageID=191.
3. Submissions to the competition must be sent by email to the National Sports Law Institute (NSLI) at munsli@maquette.edu.
   1. Address the subject line of your email to “2009 National Sports Law Writing Competition.”
   2. Attach your submission to the email in Microsoft Word.
   3. Do not include your name within the submission; instead, within your email include;
      1. your name,
      2. your contact information including email address, mailing address and telephone number,
      3. your year in school,
      4. verification that you are a law student in good standing and identification of the law school you are currently attending, and
      5. explanation of why you produced the submission, i.e., for a law school course, etc.
4. Each submission should include a title.  This title should be on the first page of the submission.  Do not send a separate title page.

The NSLI will verify participation in the competition by email within 10 days of the receipt of a submission.

JUDGING:  All submissions will be judged by the National Sports Law Institute’s Editorial Advisory Board made up of past Editors-in-Chief of the Marquette Sports Law Review and Marquette Sports Law Journal.  The review of submissions will be a blind review.

Football

• Looks like the Bills won’t be looking RB on day 1 of the draft [Rhodes joins Bills with two-year deal].
• A Division II DE hoping for a chance after the draft [Kees hopes to get deal with NFL].
• This was definitely kept from the media for a while [Shockey fires, but may rehire, Drew Rosenhaus].
• The NFL Combine is not only about 40 times and reps on the bench [NFL teams examine minds as well as bodies of potential draft picks].
• Will he be the first Mauian ever drafted into the NFL? [Maiava nears end of waiting game]
• Ian Greengross thinks C.J. Spillman will go 3rd or 4th round [Agent touts Spillman's chances in NFL Draft].

Baseball

• Apparently baseball fans like to shave [MLB and Gillette: Continuing to make sponsorship history].

Basketball

• B.J. Armstrong must love representing this guy [Rose's calm doesn't diminish following huge playoff debut].
• The NY Times seems to think the two are a match made in heaven [Bulls Rookie Has an Agent Who Knows What He’s Going Through].

This Shabbat Shalom: Friday Wrap-Up is proudly sponsored by:

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Where: James B.M. McNally Amphitheatre, Fordham Law School. 140 West 62nd Street, New York, NY.

When: Friday, April 17, 2009

Program Agenda

9:00 AM- Welcome and Opening Remarks
Opening Remarks by Tanner Rouse
Co-Editor, Fordham Sports Law Symposium

9:30 AM – Panel I
Pharmaceutical Liability and Sports

Moderator:

JOHN M. VORPERIAN, ESQ.
Professor of Sports Law/Sports Management,
Concordia College;
Host, “Beyond the Game”

Panelists:

EUGENE ROGER EGDORF, ESQ.
Pharmaceutical Litigator, The Lanier Law Firm;
Certified Contract Advisor, NFL Players Association

EUGENE LEE, ESQ.
President and Founder, ETL Associates;
Certified Contract Advisor, NFL Players Association

CAMERON A. MYLER, ESQ.
Associate, Frankfurt, Kurnit, Klein & Selz, P.C.
Four-time Olympic Luger;
Associate Counsel, World Olympians Association

5 Minute Break

11:15 AM – Panel II
Sports Journalism Ethics

Moderator:

ABNER GREENE, ESQ.
Leonard F. Manning Chair,
Professor, Fordham University Law School

Panelists:

ARI FLEISCHER
President, Ari Fleischer Sports Communications
Former White House Press Secretary

MIKE FLORIO, ESQ.
Correspondent, Profootballtalk.com

JACK MARSHALL, ESQ.
President and Founder, ProEthics;
Primary Writer and Editor, The Ethics Scoreboard

MARK CONRAD, ESQ.
Professor of Legal and Ethical Studies,
Fordham University School of Business

DAVID SUSSMAN, ESQ.
Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, LLP
Former Counsel and acting COO of the New York Yankees

1:00 – Lunch

1:45 PM – Keynote Address

Introduction by PAT F.X. FITZPATRICK, JR.
Co-Editor Fordham Sports Law Symposium

JOHN D. FEERICK, ESQ.
Sidney C. Norris Chair of Law in Public Service,
Director /Founder of the Feerick Center for Federal Justice,
Fordham University Law School

2:45 PM – Panel III
Gambling in Sports

Moderator:

MATTHEW J. MITTEN, ESQ.
Director, National Sports Law Institute;
Director of LL.M in Sports Law for Foreign Lawyers,
Marquette University Law School

Panelists:

JEFFREY STANDEN, ESQ.
Professor of Sports Law,
Willamette University;
Author of Upcoming Publication:
The Beauty of Bets: Prediction Markets, Wagers and Compensation for Professional Athletes

JAY MOYER, ESQ.
Adjunct Professor,
Fordham University Law School;
Special Counsel, National Football League

MARC EDELMAN, ESQ.
Visiting Professor,
Rutgers School of Law- Camden;
Founder and CEO, www.SportsJudge.com

SENATOR RAYMOND LESNIAK
State Senator of New Jersey
Plaintiff: Interactive Entertainment & Gaming Association, Inc., et al. v. Holder, et al.

CLE Credits and Registration Fees: Free and open to the public | 6 NYS CLE (non-transitional, professional practice) credits and lunch available for $100 ($85 for Fordham Law alumni & public interest attorneys). Lunch without CLE credit is available for $10. Fordham Law School has a financial hardship policy.

The job market sucks, whether you want to become a sports agent, a financial analyst, or even a lawyer.  Summer associateships are on the decline, and jobs out of law school are hard to find.  The firms that are hiring seem to be looking more at who you know than what you know.  Yes, we are living in the world where LinkedIn may mean more for your future employment than your GPA.

So when I read this article in the Wall Street Journal, about the rise of law school applicants while the amount of lawyer positions at law firms is falling, I was not all that surprised.  Some of my best friends are living that situation out right now.  We talk about how competitive it is to break into the world of sports agency.  The legal profession, in general, is starting to become tough to break into on its own.  If firms are firing associates left and right, what makes you think that they will entertain your novel invitation to start up a sports law division with you at the head of it all?  Not in this economy!

One important point I took from the article: In a struggling economy, people start becoming pickier with the decisions that they make.  I believe that our profession will encounter this as athletes start to choose lawyers as their agents more often than those who try to represent athletes without a J.D.