Oliver v. NCAA
Erie County Court of Common Pleas, State of Ohio
920 N.E.2d 203 (2009)
- Written by Craig Conway, LLM
Facts
Andrew Oliver (plaintiff) was the primary baseball pitcher at Vermilion High School in Erie County, Ohio. Prior to graduation, Oliver and his family retained the services of Robert M. Baratta, Tim Baratta, and Icon Sports Group (Icon), as sports advisors and attorneys. Later that summer, Oliver and his father, along with attorney Tim Baratta, met with representatives from the Minnesota Twins team at their home. The major league baseball team offered Oliver $390,000 to join the organization, but at the urging of his father, Oliver declined and, instead chose to attend Oklahoma State University (OSU) on a full scholarship to play baseball. During his freshman and sophomore years at OSU, Oliver never received any invoices from Baratta or Icon requesting payment for services rendered. After Oliver terminated the Barattas and Icon and retained Boras Corporation as his representative, Oliver received a bill for $113,750 from the Barattas for legal services rendered. Additionally, the Barattas mailed, faxed, and e-mailed a letter to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) (defendant) complaining about Oliver and disclosing the meeting with the Minnesota Twins held at Oliver’s home. Consequently, Oliver was suspended indefinitely form playing baseball for violating NCAA rules. Oliver filed suit against the NCAA seeking a temporary injunction reinstating his eligibility to play for OSU. The trial court granted the temporary injunction. Despite the court’s order allowing reinstatement of Oliver, OSU petitioned directly to the NCAA thereafter to reinstate Oliver’s eligibility. Thereafter, Oliver was suspended for one year and charged with a year of eligibility by the NCAA. The penalty was later reduced to 70 percent of the original suspension and no loss of eligibility for Oliver. Oliver then sought a permanent injunction from the court preventing enforcement of NCAA’s rules and reinstating his eligibility to play baseball at OSU.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Tone, J.)
What to do next…
Here's why 796,000 law students have relied on our case briefs:
- Written by law professors and practitioners, not other law students. 46,200 briefs, keyed to 988 casebooks. Top-notch customer support.
- The right amount of information, includes the facts, issues, rule of law, holding and reasoning, and any concurrences and dissents.
- Access in your classes, works on your mobile and tablet. Massive library of related video lessons and high quality multiple-choice questions.
- Easy to use, uniform format for every case brief. Written in plain English, not in legalese. Our briefs summarize and simplify; they don’t just repeat the court’s language.