Haywood v. National Basketball Assn.
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| Haywood v. National Basketball Assn. | ||||||||||
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| Decided March 1, 1971 |
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| Holding | ||||||||||
| Haywood was granted an injunction pendente lite which allowed him to play for Seattle and forbade NBA to take sanctions against the Seattle team. | ||||||||||
| Court membership | ||||||||||
| Chief Justice: Warren E. Burger Associate Justices: Hugo Black, William O. Douglas, John Marshall Harlan II, William J. Brennan, Jr, Potter Stewart, Byron White, Thurgood Marshall, Harry Blackmun |
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| Case opinions | ||||||||||
| Laws applied | ||||||||||
| Sherman Antitrust Act | ||||||||||
Haywood v. National Basketball Assn. (401 U.S. 1204) is a 1971 U.S. Supreme Court decision that ruled, 7-2, against the National Basketball Association’s old requirement that a player must complete four years of college eligibility before turning pro. The rule did not expressly state that a player had to attend college or place an age restriction on players entering the NBA, although clearly those were the intentions behind the rule. What the rule did in fact state was that "a player could not make himself available" to be drafted by a NBA team unless he waited fours years following his graduation from high school.
Spencer Haywood turned pro after his sophomore season at the University of Detroit, joining the American Basketball Association’s Denver Rockets and leading the league in scoring (30.0 per game) and rebounding (19.5 per game) in 1969-70 before jumping to the NBA the following season. Seattle Sonics owner Sam Schulman signed Haywood to a six-year, $1.5 million contract, ignoring the rule that a player cannot join the league until he is four years out of high school. As a result, the NBA threatened to disallow the contract and implement various punitive sanctions against the Sonics.
Haywood challenged this decision by commencing an antitrust action against the NBA that eventually went to the United States Supreme Court in 1971. As part of his claim against the NBA, Haywood argued that the conduct of the NBA was a "group boycott" and a violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act. The central issue that had to be determined was whether the NBA draft policy was a restraint on trade and therefore was illegal in accordance with the Sherman Act.
The District Court ruled: “If Haywood is unable to continue to play professional basketball for Seattle, he will suffer irreparable injury in that a substantial part of his playing career will have been dissipated, his physical condition, skills and coordination will deteriorate from lack of high- level competition, his public acceptance as a super star will diminish to the detriment of his career, his self-esteem and his pride will have been injured and a great injustice will be perpetrated on him.”
The decision allowed a significant number of high school graduates and college attendees make themselves eligible for the NBA Draft before completing four years in college.
[edit] See also
- List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 401
- Toolson v. New York Yankees,
- Silver v. New York Stock Exchange,
- Brown v. Pro Football, Inc.,
- Clarett v. National Football League, 369 F.3d 124 (2d Cir. 2004)
[edit] Further reading
- Allison, John R. (1973). "Professional Sports and the Antitrust Laws: Status of the Reserve System". Baylor Law Review XXV (1).
- Wise, Aaron N.; Meyer, Bruce S. (1997). International Sports Law and Business. New York: Kluwer Law International, 47–48. ISBN 9041109773.
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