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Terminate Urlacher? You Must Be Dreaming – SPORTS AGENT BLOG
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Terminate Urlacher? You Must Be Dreaming

Brian Urlacher

One benefit of going to law school is that you have the opportunity to take drafting classes, where you will learn tricks about terms to place in various types of contracts.  For instance, this past summer I took a class titled, Analysis and Drafting of Intellectual Property.  Our major project was a license agreement, with paragraph titles including, Payment of Royalties, Right of Appearance and Publicity, and Non-Endorsement of Competitors’ Products, all of which would normally be in any endorsement deal you strike for an athlete client.

Very rarely is a non-lawyer or law student exposed to a contract including these types of paragraphs, but today is your lucky day.  Dream Inc., a sports memorabilia company, terminated Brian Urlacher‘s 4-year, $1.2 million contract just days after he suffered a season-ending wrist injury.  Urlacher’s attorneys filed suit against Dream Inc. last Thursday, hoping to get at least $600,000 in damages for Dream Inc. breaching the contract.

After a bit of scouring the web, I was able to find the actual complaint that Urlacher’s attorneys have filed, which may be read below.

The complaint is only 12 pages long, a breeze for any law student who is used to assignments six times that size.  Our main concern is looking at the terms of the contract he signed.  Unfortunately, I cannot get my hands on Exhibit A, which is the actual contract, but the complaint does tell a good portion of what is embodied in the personal appearances and authentic autographs agreement Urlacher signed.  Additionally, Darren Rovell provides a nice breakdown.

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.

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