Sports
Our Sports practice has been servicing the legal needs of individuals and businesses involved in the sports sector for over 20 years.
We have advised on some of the biggest deals and disputes, involving many of the key operators and stakeholders in the sector relating to some of the world’s leading sports events, personalities and properties. We have worked on high profile matters involving every major American sports league, as well as the Premier League, the Olympic Games, WWE, FIFA World Cup, Formula 1, and various eSports properties.
We have a market-leading international team of sport and entertainment lawyers throughout the United States, Asia Pacific, Europe and the Middle East. We offer the benefits of a global business law firm, with a network of experience extending throughout the United States and across the world. Leveraging our global platform, our sports law practice is equipped to provide assistance to clients swiftly and on an informed basis from our offices around the world, utilizing not only our legal skills and local market knowledge, but also our extensive networks and lobbying capabilities.
Our team has deep collective experience representing clients in the sports industry, particularly around:
- Media rights (ownership, protection, exploitation, strategic joint ventures, and traditional and over-the-top methods of distribution)
- Stadium related real estate finance and tax incentives in connection therewith
- League expansion
- Acquisition and disposition matters
- Strategic value-add partnerships between various stakeholders in the sports sector
- General corporate and financing matters
- Government relations
- Sponsorship, naming rights and endorsement deals
- Event bidding, staging, hosting, participation arrangements, and venue and stadium hire agreements
- Intellectual property protection
- Ticketing and hospitality
- Merchandising
- Concessionaire agreements
- Antitrust law
- Domestic and international regulation
- Sports integrity (anti-doping, corruption, and investigations)
- Sports-related litigation
Chambers
Ranked by Chambers USA for Sports Law nationally, 2024
Ranked by Chambers Asia-Pacific for Sports Law in Australia, 2024
Thought Leadership
On 3 December 2024, Judge Amos Mazzant of the Eastern District of Texas issued a nationwide preliminary injunction with respect to the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA), enjoining enforcement of the CTA as well as the implementing Treasury regulations, and staying the 1 January 2025 reporting deadline until further order of the Court.
In the October edition of The Essentials, we summarize key provisions of California employment laws that took effect in 2024 and those that will take effect in 2025.
On 22 December 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) adopted amendments (the final rule) to Rule 206(4)-1 under the Investment Advisers Act of 1940 (the Advisers Act) to modernize the regulation of investment adviser advertising and solicitation practices.
In this semiannual series on the U.S. Department of Labor's Regulatory Agenda, partners Craig Leen and Kathleen Parker discuss recent updates to the regulatory agenda and what employers should expect in terms of new labor and employment regulations in 2023.