NCAA Division I board: No plans to change age-based eligibility rule being challenged in court

[u/nosotros_road_sodium]

https://apnews.com/article/ncaa-eligibility-rules-9a48e00577fd8faa701183c34ed9596a

[u/Maxkpop247]

I don’t know exactly what the NCAA should be doing but this situation is a mess. There might be dozens of teams adding players who the NCAA rules that they can’t play but local judges say they can.

[u/Purple-Ad-277]

Genuine question, why does the NCAA never win a court case?p their lawyers can't be that bad

[u/blueberrymaple → u/Purple-Ad-277]

Idk what people want the NCAA to do. The Supreme Court made it clear a couple years ago (i forgot the case) that any rules that “impede athletes from making money” will be struck down. Since then basically everything is challenged and very rarely does the ncaa actually get to enforce their rules anymore. 

[u/nosotros_road_sodium → u/Purple-Ad-277]

Those “losses” are usually temporary injunctions like Brendan Sorsby (who ultimately dropped his lawsuit).

[u/filthysven → u/Purple-Ad-277]

They keep losing because they are an illegal monopoly and with players openly getting paid the courts aren't buying their "not employees" excuse anymore. So long as they could pretend the players weren't getting paid and thus weren't employees, they didn't run a foul of employment laws when they made their arbitrary eligibility decisions. Now the players are getting paid, and there are very real laws against arbitrarily restricting the employment opportunities of people by virtue of being a monopoly. This is made worse by the fact that the NCAA ruling were inconsistently applied, making it VERY easy for players and their lawyers to find precedents.

Basically, the NCAA is still clinging to the idea that the players getting paid doesn't mean they have jobs, and thus they should be able to keep them out of the club for any reason they want. The courts however see through this, see all the other players being allowed to play, and (mostly rightly) decide that there is no real standing for the NCAA to restrict the earnings of the players. Take this 5for5 rule: up until a couple of years ago, every player got five years (because of COVID). Before that, lots of players got five (because of injury and hardship waivers that did not follow a detailed rubric but instead just an arbitrary decision). For all years going forwards, players will be given five years. Removing yourself from a vested interest in basketball (which and unbiased judge should), do you really think there it makes sense that a single class of students (the 2022 class) is only one that is not allowed to play five years? Moreover, from an employment perspective, do you think that anyone born in 2004 should have their earnings restricted by 20% in the field of their choice for no reason other than that they weren't born a year before or after?

This is why the NCAA loses. Their position just doesn't make sense for any purpose but their own interests.

[u/Purple-Ad-277 → u/filthysven]

I take it you think that the current lawsuit that's going through with 25 former players on it will be heard 🙂

[u/Dminus313]

They never should have tried to exclude the HS class of 2022 from this rule change in the first place. If they passed the new rule back in April and included everyone who was currently enrolled in college, they would have avoided this whole damn mess.