Inconsistent Rules, Unequal Outcomes: The NCAA Problem
By J. Ben Bozzo/ Edited by Juliana Pascual
The recent adjustments by the NCAA surrounding collegiate athletics eligibility have led to a series of cases built by the NCAA’s legally contradictory policies. Consider four examples:
University of Alabama center Charles Bediako chose to enter the 2023 NBA Draft after two seasons in Tuscaloosa. After going undrafted and toiling in the developmental NBA G League, Bediako decided to return to Alabama to play NCAA basketball. After playing five games under a temporary restraining order issued by an Alabama state court judge, another judge ruled that Bediako was ineligible because signing an NBA contract and playing in the G League violated NCAA bylaws preserving amateurism.
University of Virginia forward Thijs de Ridder led his team in both points and rebounds. Like Bediako, de Ridder is also 23 years old and played professionally for two seasons, although de Ridder played professionally in Belgium and Spain. But, unlike Bediako, de Ridder was granted two years of college eligibility while his name-image-likeness deal pays him an estimated $218,000 per year.
The NCAA is appealing a Mississippi state court decision allowing University of Mississippi quarterback Trinidad Chambliss an additional year of eligibility because he missed the 2002 season at his previous university, Ferris State, because of a respiratory condition.
The NCAA granted a ninth year of eligibility to University of Miami Tight End Cam McCormick, who first enrolled in college in 2016, took a discretionary “red shirt” during his freshman year, but missed the 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 seasons to injury.
There seems to be no consistent logic in reconciling these results, stemming from the fact that not a single body of law exists to universally address these cases.
If Bediako had the talent to enter the NBA instead of going to college, he could not. The NBA’s collective bargaining agreement bars players whose high school graduating class is not at least one year removed from high school graduation. Similarly, the NFL bars players whose high school graduating class is not at least three seasons removed from high school graduation. The NBA’s rationale for the one-year gap is that, by waiting a year after high school, prospective players are better prepared physically and mentally for life in the NBA. However, this rationale is hard to take seriously when there are many players — such as USC’s Chad Baker-Mazara and Kansas’s Nginyu Ngala — who are both 26. As a labor union, the NBA Players Union seeks to protect the jobs of its members, which includes protecting their roles from being taken by younger players – who are not yet members of the union. It seems to be an unfair restraint of trade, but courts are highly deferential to the NBA’s collective bargaining agreement with the players’ union under the nonstatutory labor law exemption. In January, Bediako asserted an antitrust claim against the NCAA, asserting that the NCAA was preventing him from a chance to earn money playing basketball, but the judge rejected the antitrust argument and stated the NCAA was only stopping Bediako from making money playing basketball in the NCAA. However, the only rationale for treating de Ridder differently is that courts are respecting the NCAA’s more relaxed prohibitions against international professional players, leading to a plethora of former professionals playing college basketball.
Speaking of nonsense, it seems irreconcilable that the NCAA would seek to prevent Trinidad Chambliss from receiving a sixth year of eligibility (including four seasons, not counting a discretionary “red shirt” and an illness red shirt) while allowing Cam McCormack a ninth season. Mississippi state court judge Robert Whitell made the decision for Chambliss because he was the intended third-party beneficiary of the contracts between the NCAA and its member schools, and the NCAA failed to act in good faith in applying its bylaws. By arguing for his eligibility as a matter of contract law, Chambliss avoided the high burden of proof required to succeed in an antitrust claim. Chambliss is not entitled to any of the deference that supports the anticompetitive posture of the NBA players' union toward young American players therefor his argument was focused on his contract.
This discussion of who should receive additional years of eligibility does not even consider the result of the lawsuit brought by former Vanderbilt University quarterback Diego Pavia, who overcame an attempt by the NCAA to reduce his eligibility because he played two years of non-NCAA junior college football. Pavia successfully argued that the NCAA eligibility constituted an antitrust violation. Because junior college football has no contractual arrangement with junior colleges, what justification could the NCAA assert that would allow it to regulate the activities of non-NCAA amateur athletes?
It is difficult to reconcile eligibility matters. Would Bediako have succeeded in having his eligibility restored on the basis of contract law, like Chambliss? Would an Alabama court have ruled any differently if Bediako had argued that he was the intended third-party beneficiary of the NCAA’s contracts with its member universities — or would an Alabama court simply have ruled differently? If Bediako — or someone like him — were to appeal his case, could an appellate court reconcile that the NCAA is not able to exclude junior college athletes on the basis of antitrust law? However, as the governing body of collegiate athletics, can the NCAA prevent former NCAA athletes from reentering college?
How can the NCAA get away with treating Thijs de Ridder’s international professional experience differently from that of Charles Bediako? In early March, President Donald Trump hosted a “Saving College Sports” roundtable and promised an executive order addressing these concerns in collegiate athletics.
Young American athletes are currently caught between deference to the NCAA on one hand and the deference to collective bargaining agreements of the NBA and NCAA on the other. However, the successful case of Trinidad Chambliss’s contract argument to allow for former college athletes to return to the NCAA could serve as another avenue for decisions in favor of collegiate athletes. Setting this precedent surrounding Chambliss's being allowed to stay in school, while the Bediakos, who dared to test professional waters, are barred from the NCAA, creates yet another contradiction in the legal doctrine of the NCAA.
Universities are fighting against American college athletes being classified as “employees” with an ability to unionize, leaving college athletes in limbo between the ceiling of labor law preventing them from entering traditional professional sports and the inconsistent rules of the NCAA that want to keep young U.S. “amateur” athletes in school. All the while, the NCAA is welcoming international professionals, like de Ridder, who can add to the quality of the multibillion-dollar collegiate product. It seems reasonable that an “America First” administration might put its thumb on the scale to favor Bediako, who is both an American and a Canadian citizen, rather than Belgian-born de Ridder. However, given the anti-Canadian sentiment of the administration, the administration may not be as entirely sympathetic toward Bediako. To prevent future confounding cases increasing the number of contradictions surrounding collegiate eligibility, the NCAA must define more consistent rules treating international and American athlete eligibility the same, based on professional experience and medical exceptions. Otherwise, the NCAA risks remaining filled with legally dubious, arbitrary rulings which may [future consequence].
