“Sports Law” is actually a bunch of areas of law, from areas that are studied in the first couple years of law school like contracts, constitutional law, and torts, to more complex areas of law like antitrust law and labor law.

We will start out this class with a look at the broad view of sports starting at the collegiate level - looking at male and female sports, why college sports started out as amateur (unpaid) and has changed to becoming paid through the name, image and, likeness deals. Then we will look at male and female professional sports on a wide scale, then a brief look at international sports.

This class will attempt to give an overview of how the law is applied to the four major sports in the United States: the NFL, the NHL, MLB, and the NBA.

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Every major sport is divided into two major large entities: the owners of the franchises and the players union. These two entities negotiate with each other every five to ten years (depending on the sport and the contract) to create a contract, which is known as a collective bargaining agreement (CBA). These contracts are usually available for download on the internet, and they can be hundreds of pages long (The NFL CBA is 456 pages long!).

While we won’t look at the entire contract, we will look at pieces of the contracts to understand various areas like how salaries are determined, is the money that the athletes get in their contracts guaranteed or do they have to earn the money with certain performance standards (If you get 5 touchdowns this season, you get this amount of $$, if you get 10 touchdowns this season, you get this amount of $$$), and what happens if you get injured, among other topics.

As we go through the different sports, we will compare them to each other and discuss why there is a difference between them. We may also look at previous contracts and see how the contracts have evolved and changed throughout the years as sports have grown from what they were early in the 1900s to now.

After this course, the learner should have a greater understanding of how sports operates as a business from the collegiate to the professional level.

Here is the schedule for the Fall semester (schedule may change during the semester due to holidays and other potential situations):

Week 1 (August 20 - August 26): Big Picture Sports - College
-	We will look at the overall picture in sports, looking at sports starting at a college level, male and female sports, what they are, how big they are across the United States, and how much money they bring in depending on sport and region. We will also look at the rules governing the sports.

Week 2 (August 27 - September 2): College Recruiting, the NCAA, TV Deals, and Coaching contracts
-  	We will look at College Recruiting, the NCAA rules, how the college conferences negotiate contract deals, and how coaching contracts are different.

Week 3 (September 3 - September 9): What is the Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL)? 
-	We will look at what the college rules were like before Name, Image, and Likeness became a thing. We will look at NIL laws, and how this drastically changed the college sports landscape. 

Week 4 (September 10 - September 16 ): The National Football League - The Salary Cap and the Draft
-	We will talk about the salary cap for the league, and then we will look at the requirements of the draft, what happens with the draft, the contracts that rookies can receive, how trades can happen during the draft, and talk about anything unique to the sport for the draft in this class.

Week 5 (September 17 - September 23): The NFL - Free Agency, Salaries, and Contracts
-	How is free agency run, what are the salaries that can be earned in the league, and what can the contracts have in them?

Week 6 (September 24 - September 30): NFL - Unique to the NFL
-	We will look at unique contract elements that apply only to the NFL in this class.

Week 7 (October 1 - October 7): Major League Baseball - The Salary Cap and the Draft
-	We will talk about the salary cap for the league, and then we will look at the requirements of the draft, what happens with the draft, the contracts that rookies can receive, how trades can happen during the draft, and talk about anything unique to the sport for the draft in this class.

Week 8 (October 8 - October 14): MLB - Free Agency, Salaries, and Contracts
-	How is free agency run, what are the salaries that can be earned in the league, and what can the contracts have in them?

Week 9 (October 15 - October 21): MLB - Unique to the MLB
-	We will look at unique contract elements that apply only to the MLB in this class.

Week 10 (October 22 - October 28): The National Hockey League - The Salary Cap and the Draft
-	We will talk about the salary cap for the league, and then we will look at the requirements of the draft, what happens with the draft, the contracts that rookies can receive, how trades can happen during the draft, and talk about anything unique to the sport for the draft in this class.

Week 11 (October 29 - November 4): NHL - Free Agency, Salaries, and Contracts
-	How is free agency run, what are the salaries that can be earned in the league, and what can the contracts have in them?

Week 12 (November 5 - November 11): NHL - Unique to the NHL
-	We will look at unique contract elements that apply only to the NHL in this class.

Week 13 (November 12 - November 18): The National Basketball Association - The Salary Cap and the Draft
-	We will talk about the salary cap for the league, and then we will look at the requirements of the draft, what happens with the draft, the contracts that rookies can receive, how trades can happen during the draft, and talk about anything unique to the sport for the draft in this class.

Week 14 (November 19 - November 25): NBA - Free Agency, Salaries, and Contracts
-	How is free agency run, what are the salaries that can be earned in the league, and what can the contracts have in them?

Week 15 (November 26 - December 2): NBA - Unique to the NBA
-	We will look at unique contract elements that apply only to the NBA in this class.

Week 16 (December 3 - December 9): The Wrap Up
- 	We will finish any comparisons between the leagues that we need to do, and then I will leave this class to explore any questions that the students may have that we didn’t cover in the class. We will be collecting these questions throughout the semester as I won’t be able to address everything the students will want to know in the preceding classes.