“Morals Clauses” in Sports Contracts – More Important Now Than Ever Before?

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NFL players Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson are the latest in a long line of professional athletes whose misdeeds have been exposed to the glare of public scrutiny and discourse on whether they should be terminated or suspended due to their conduct away from the playing field.  Implicit in the dialogue and debate on the proper response of professional sports leagues and teams to the off-field misdeeds of their players is the contractual right to terminate or suspend  players under the so-called “morals clauses” of the league constitutions and individual playing contracts.

“Morals clauses” date to 1920’s Hollywood contracts and have become ubiquitous in both athletic playing contracts and endorsement agreements.  Each of the four major team sports leagues in North America include “morals clauses” in the standard player contracts in their collective bargaining agreements.  Section 11 of the NFL standard player contract, for instance, provides that “if Player has engaged in personal conduct reasonably judged by Club to adversely affect or reflect on Club, then Club may terminate this contract.”  Moreover, the NFL Personal Conduct Policy authorizes the NFL Commissioner “to impose discipline as warranted” when a player fails to conduct himself “in a way that is responsible, promotes the values upon which the League is based, and is lawful . . . even where the conduct itself does not result in conviction of a crime.”

Endorsement contracts between players and corporations also typically include a “morals clause” which may be less broad than is found in the typical playing contract, to the extent negotiated and agreed upon by the parties.  The enforceability of such clauses turns on the scope of the contractual language as applied to the conduct at issue.  A carefully drafted contractual “moral clause” has become an ever-increasing necessity for corporations—as well as leagues and teams—who invest substantial sums in both the performance and reputation of players whose conduct away from the field of play has significant economic impact.  Accordingly, the implications of a player’s off-field immoral and illegal conduct on his earning power can be far-reaching and swift, especially in the case of high-profile players such as Wheaties cover-star Adrian Peterson.  Indeed, a news report on September 15, 2014 (see Wheaties pulls all content of Vikings’ Adrian Peterson off website) indicates that Wheaties has already pulled all content of Adrian Peterson off its website.

It is too early to tell what, if any, litigation may result from the current invocation of the “morals clauses” against either Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson.  At minimum, the public discussion of the morality of a player’s off-field conduct, and the impact of such conduct on his ability to continue to earn a living as a professional athlete, is an opportunity for the intersection of sports and the law to serve the culture.  As one commentator has noted, sports, despite the failings of its participants, have the ability to “be a field of authentic humanity, where young people are encouraged to learn the great values of life and to spread everywhere the great virtues that are the basis of a worthy human society, such as tolerance, respect for human dignity, peace and brotherhood” (see “Sports at the Service of People” – Pope John Paul II’s Timeless Relation to Sports).

In other words, in addition to fulfilling the obvious function of protecting the economic investment of leagues, teams, and corporate sponsors, there is hope that the enforcement of contractual “morals clauses” in connection with the recent highly-publicized incidents will also serve as a warning and deterrent for other athletes and help raise the moral bar inside and outside the sports community.

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