The Ed O'Bannon Case

Sunday, I was engaged with a few other SU basketball fans in yet another session of collective and vigorous head-scratching over the NCAA's harsh ruling. Our discussion came around to the Ed O'Bannon ruling, which my friends weren't immediately familiar with.

Here is a nice, short column from Grantland's Charles P. Pierce in the middle of the trial.

And here is ESPN's wrap-up following the ruling against the NCAA, which includes a helpful explanation of exactly what the ruling means. (I have yet to see a similarly clear explanation of exactly what the NCAA's ruling against SU says, hence my continuing slog through the report to figure it out myself. Most reporting still seems to focus on how bad the report is for SU and Boeheim.)

Finally, here is the most significant direct fallout from the case - the NCAA's decision to stop licensing its players to videogame makers. No more NCAA Football games from EA Sports.

Most interesting to me is this part of the ruling: The NCAA can cap payments to football and men's basketball players for using their names and likenesses as long as that cap isn't less than $5,000 a year for every year they compete.

This ruling is NOT about paying players to play. That is separate case working its way through the courts, apparently. So I know I'm mis-applying the ruling here, but... SU is being penalized for a little more than $8,000 of cash reaching the hands of five football and men's basketball players. That's much less than the $5,000 per player per year of play minimum going forward the NCAA would have to pay for using their likeness. Which it won't do, because it decided to stop licensing the games. Because NCAA sports are all about amateurism!