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University of Miami Comments on New Football Agent Policy

Yesterday, I published my first article at Forbes (I recently signed an agreement to become a Contributor for the magazine’s SportsMoney column).  The article is titled, University Of Miami Unveils Football Agent Policy Aimed At ‘Limiting Distractions’, and it looks at the recently implemented policy that attempts to restrict communication between football agents and football players at the school.

At the time of publishing, Chris Freet (Associate Director of Athletics for Communications for the University of Miami) did not have much to comment.  Since then, he has answered a couple of my questions, which follow:

Darren Heitner: I look at the NCAA planning on scrapping many of its social media policies that restrict recruiting communications between coaches and recruits.  They find enforcement of the current rules to be nearly impossible.  How do you plan to discover social media communication?  Will you require athletes to hand over passwords?
Chris Freet: Our policy will continue to evolve over time and we will adjust to legislation from the NCAA.  We do not currently have any plans to ask for passwords.
Heitner: Why choose this policy instead of doing an Agent Day and forming a Professional Sports Counseling Panel – inviting “Covered Individuals” on campus to speak to athletes?
Freet: We have and will continue to do educational seminars with teams and staff. For example, a rep from the NFLPA spoke to all of our players, a good number of the 2012 signees and many family members before our spring game this year.

By Darren Heitner

Darren Heitner created Sports Agent Blog as a New Year's Resolution on December 31, 2005. Originally titled, "I Want To Be A Sports Agent," the website was founded with the intention of causing Heitner to learn more about the profession that he wanted to join, meet reputable individuals in the space and force himself to stay on top of the latest news and trends.

Heitner now runs Heitner Legal, P.L.L.C., which is a law firm with many practice areas, including sports law and contract law. Heitner has represented numerous athletes and sports agents as legal counsel. He has also served as an Adjunct Professor at Indiana University Bloomington from 2011-2014, where he created and taught a course titled, Sport Agency Management, which included subjects ranging from NCAA regulations to athlete agent certification and the rules governing the profession. Heitner serves as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, where he teaches a Sports Law class that includes case law surrounding athlete agents and the NCAA rules.