Sports Law Links

Each week The Sports Esquires keep track of the top sports law headlines so you don’t have to.  This week’s edition features new changes for MLB, an update on FIFA’s ongoing corruption scandal, and the McLaren report on Russian athletes’ doping.

MLB

• Players’ meal money takes big hit in new CBA.
• Ken Davidoff explains how MLB gained more leeway to discipline Jeurys Familia.
• The Rule 5 draft has dropped the AA phase.
• Maury Brown: how wearable technology quietly entered MLB.

NCAA

• The Seventh Circuit affirms district court ruling that college athletes aren’t employees. Here’s the decision.
• Art Briles sues Baylor for libel and conspiracy. Michael McCann’s analysis.

Sports Gambling and Fantasy Sports

• How DraftKings and FanDuel hope to woo the FTC and Department of Justice to permit their merger.
• What’s the outlook for legal sports betting in the Trump era?

Soccer

• Court of Arbitration for Sport dismisses Sepp Blatter’s appeal of six-year ban.
• FIFA’s independent ethics committee has banned several former officials after a corruption investigation.

NFL

• A good look at the complications of public-private scientific research in the NFL.
• Disabled fan sues 49ers over access to Levi’s Stadium.

Best of the Rest

• McLaren report finds more than 1,000 Russian athletes were involved in doping. Nancy Armour: an independent testing agency is the only way to restore integrity to the Olympics.  The story behind the report: Richard McLaren and an exhausting trail.
• Matthew Heimlich: can the NHL and NHLPA avoid a work stoppage?
• Founders of a small professional golf tour sued for securities fraud.