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Demond Williams enters portal

To me, this sounds like something that will go to state law… if Washington is anything like California, the laws are ultra employee friendly. Employers can’t have any sort of non-competes, etc that are enforceable.

Until the NCAA/college football get some anti-trust exemption like professional leagues, my initial inclination is that it will be unenforceable.
 
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AtlAtty said:
This is interesting in that UW is not going to a court to force Williams to play. Rather it is saying that Williams agreed not to enter the portal by signing his deal with UW, and that only UW can use Williams NIL.
I have to admit it is an interesting way to word the contract. I still don’t know how UW can force Williams do anything, but it may limit his options if he leaves. I can’t see any judge wanting to enforce the first clause because it restrains player/employee movement. And there is no damamge to UW if it does not pay Williams NIL deal because the school will be saving money, in effect, by not paying him.

Definitely interesting.
I know we have some folks on CIS who deal more with contracts. I would love to get some opinions on the enforceability of this contract.
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Yeah I agree with you, no way they can force him to play for UW, that argument is DOA.

Non-competes are also getting gutted across the country, good luck trying to enforce that and even if you did I am sure he could argue he is transferring to a school not on UW schedule so cant be competition.

The not entering the portal thing is interesting and I would want to see how it is worded. Could he pull a Lucas? i.e. not got in the portal, withdraw from school and just enroll in another? Seems to be a clear and easy loophole that doesnt violate the contract. No way they can force him to stay enrolled at UW. Same with the NIL, so sure school cant pay him, but then he would just get a random third party to stroke the check to work around the NIL right issue.

I also doubt it matters legally. MAYBE some school will have to settle and pay some cash but so what, settlement will be confidential and it will all go away. I also see this as a timing issue, similar to the Pavia JUCO ruling. He goes and gets a temporary injunction allowing him to play, as far as I know the case is still "pending" but now so what if he loses and JUCO does count towards eligibility? Do they (NCAA) vacate vandy wins this year for playing an ineligible guy? Unlikely. But for Pavias situation though he got to play and put out more good tape and made a Heisman run. Win for him.

I see the same happening here. UW sues Demond to try and enforce, he counters gets a TRO allowing him to play, attorneys drag it out 8 months, and he plays then the issue largely becomes moot.
 
Tony4Canes said:
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I'm not sure why any athlete at this point is signing a contract like that. Even if none of that holds up in court, the mere hassle would cause me to go somewhere else to play football.

Their problem is with the sports lack of governance, not Williams, and they're the ones doing nothing about the governance.

I will never side with any entity trying to enforce a non-compete.
 
PSU Cane said:
One question about Demond's situation vs Xavier Lucas.

For Lucas, the contract was with the Collective, right? It might have had language with future revenue sharing possibilities but those were not in place yet. If Demond's is a contract with the actual school for revenue sharing, does that make his situation legally different than Lucas, and something with more teeth on the Washington side?
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From what I have been told Washington is not going to go after him for the NIL part they’re going after him for the revenue share part and the fact that had they known that he was going to do this there were other portal options available in terms of how to be compensated and the damages

A separate issue might be whether they think there is tampering from a school that they decide to sue them directly or not ala Wisconsin
 
Ispyin said:
From what I have been told Washington is not going to go after him for the NIL part they’re going after him for the revenue share part and the fact that had they known that he was going to do this there were other portal options available in terms of how to be compensated and the damages

A separate issue might be whether they think there is tampering from a school that they decide to sue them directly or not ala Wisconsin
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It seems impossible to identify the damage associated with losing Williams. Any number is basically made up. As is the argument that ‘we would have brought in a different QB had we known, and this will cost us __$$$’.

@Cookie917 provided a great analysis of the contract issues. I wonder if either of you have an opinion as to whether the next school could be successfully sued for Interfering with UW’s business relationship with Williams? Again, damages are next to impossible to prove, but maybe they feel just receiving a successful decision/verdict is worth the time and cost.
 
AtlAtty said:
It seems impossible to identify the damage associated with losing Williams. Any number is basically made up. As is the argument that ‘we would have brought in a different QB had we known, and this will cost us __$$$’.

@Cookie917 provided a great analysis of the contract issues. I wonder if either of you have an opinion as to whether the next school could be successfully sued for Interfering with UW’s business relationship with Williams? Again, damages are next to impossible to prove, but maybe they feel just receiving a successful decision/verdict is worth the time and cost.
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I agree with you, damages are hard as **** to prove. It is not like I contracted with you to build my pool for 100k, you breach and now I had to pay someone else 150k for the same pool. Damages there are easy. I am sure they could get some economist or "expert" to give an opinion based on comparing maybe ticket sales, jersey revenue, something to show UW Football in 2025 made more than in 2026 and the reason was Demond. Still it is not an easy proof case.

That is why if they do sue I dont see it going to trial and I would see the defendant paying a simple cost of defense offer. Especially if they cannot recover attorney fees. You will be paying your attorneys 6-7 figures regardless for an unknown result and potentially bad precedent. I think Plaintiff has the same bad precedent issue, i.e. we take this to court and lose, well now all our contracts are voidable. Sounds like something both sides would want to avoid, thus a hush money settlement and people move on. The threat is more powerful than the actual suit in my eyes. I wonder if the contract has an LD provision, that is usually the easy way but it has to be somewhat tied to harm or it is an unenforceable penalty.

But again I go back to none of this deals with eligibility or him playing. It is money changing hands, they might as well just put in buy out language like the head coaches as that is essentially what will happen. You tamper and take my player (or coach) you have to pay X. Makes it a bit pricier and may take away some appetite but not much if someone really wants the player.

Edit: I see the post above mine has a tweet saying they do have buy-out language but it is in the SOLE discretion of the school? Yeah that aint enforceable.
 
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wnycanesfan said:
She might want to sit this one out given her husband's profession. Pretty sure if an NFL team offered him their HC position the family would be on the next plane out of town.
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to be fair, that's not her complaint. Her complaint is the timing of his announcement.
 
The U is back to work said:
It seems like Miami LSU and TTU just had Sorsby as their plan and now pivoting however they can. Should have seen he was heading to TTU and had other plans.
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Except this isn't true.

We've been exchanging numbers with multiple agents for multiple QBs for multiple weeks.
 
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