Sports Law

Sports Law is a richly engaging, multidisciplinary area of expertise that encompasses a spectrum of business and transactional disciplines, including intellectual property, antitrust, and labor law as well as civil rights concerns like gender equality. The Sports Law Program at Temple University Beasley School of Law offers a comprehensive curriculum, wide variety of experiential opportunities, and extracurricular activities including competition teams and participation in student organizations through which students can test and hone essential skills, build confidence, and create professional networks. Students in Temple’s Sports Law Program will gain important professional skills like research and writing, business planning, transactional skills, and negotiation and drafting. The knowledge and skills acquired by students in the Sports Law Program are essential to the sports industry and easily transferable to other industries as well.

The Sports Law Program at Temple University Beasley School of Law offers a comprehensive education about sports law both in the classroom and through experiential learning. Students will have the opportunity to gain hands-on experience through internships within sports organizations, agencies, law firms and our very own Name, Image and Likeness Initiative in conjunction with Philadelphia City Councilmember Isaiah Thomas. Students will also have the opportunity to compete in various national sports negotiation competitions.

The Temple Sports Law department offers core courses including Sports Law, International Sports Law and Advanced Sports Contract Negotiation and Drafting as well as adjacent courses including Antitrust Law, Labor and Employment Law and Intellectual Property.

  • Negotiation Competition Team: Students compete in national sports and entertainment competitions. Previous competitions have included the Tulane Professional Football Negotiation Competition and the Baseball Arbitration Competition at Villanova.
  • Sports and Entertainment Law Society: The Sports and Entertainment Law Society is a student-run organization that provides guest speakers, mentorship, career workshops and alumni connections for law students interested in sports and entertainment law. Previous speakers have included player agents, general counsels from professional teams, lead contract negotiations from professional teams and outside counsel for teams or players. If you have any questions please email lawsels@temple.edu.
  • Intellectual Property Law Society: The Temple Law School Intellectual Property Law Society (IPLS) promotes the discussion of the legal challenges presented by technological advances through speakers and events.
  • Business and Tax Law Society: The Temple Law School Business Law Society (BLS) is a collaborative group offering resources, information, advice, and support to all members as they seek to develop a successful full-time career in business law.

Internships and externships are valuable opportunities to gain perspective and practical experience in the field, build a professional network, and identify potential career paths. Previous placements have included the Philadelphia Eagles, Harris Blitzer Sports and Entertainment, Philadelphia Phillies, CAA, MLB, Buzz Sports and within the Sports and Entertainment divisions of law firms including Law Offices of Lloyd Z. Remick, Pillar + Aught and Jeff Fannell & Associates.

*This is a representation of previous experiential opportunities in which Temple Law students have been placed and not an exhaustive list.

NIL Initiative

The Name, Image and Likeness Initiative establishes a suite of services designed to help local student-athletes and their families navigate the ever-changing landscape of high school and collegiate sports and more specifically NIL.

One of those services is an advisory hotline for students and their families with questions related to NIL or who have been approached with an NIL offer. The hotline, which launched on Jan. 25, is staffed by Temple Law students under the supervision of Professor Jacobsen and other practicing attorneys with expertise in NIL.

The partnership will also produce and distribute educational materials including handouts, public service announcement videos and a webpage, which will contain easy-to-understand, graphically rich information about the rights of student-athletes in NIL negotiations. 

FAQ

Yes! Students can earn credit for internships or hands on experiences through practicums with law firms, teams, agents, charitable foundations and related organizations. Students can apply to participate in the school designed Sports Law Practicum which focuses on the Name, Image and Likeness Joint Project with the City of Philadelphia through Councilmember Isaiah Thomas’s office. In this Practicum, students will develop program material, engage in outreach and advocacy with and for student-athletes in Philadelphia area high schools, and work with City Council to further their mission set forth in the “Youth Name, Image and Likeness Protection” bill authored by Councilmember Thomas. Additionally, students may have the opportunity to assist in both writing and ushering through future legislation at the city government level.

Sports law is an inter-disciplinary field of law that governs amateur and professional sports leagues and clubs, athletes, and other sports-related individuals and entities. It encompasses many areas of the law, including:

  • Contracts, Antitrust, Labor, Intellectual Property, Criminal , Civil Rights (e.g., race and gender issues in sports), International Law (e.g. the Olympics, FIFA), Agents, Media and Broadcasting rights and many other areas of the law.

We offer Sports Law (Amateur and Professional Sports), International Sports Law and Advanced Sports Contract Negotiating and Drafting. Adjacent courses relevant to Sports Law include those in Antitrust Law, Labor and Employment Law, Intellectual Property and transactional courses, especially those that involve skills training in drafting legal documents.

Yes, student teams compete in multiple negotiation competitions at various law schools throughout the year. Previous competitions have included the Tulane Pro Football Contact Negotiation Competition, the Tulane International Baseball Arbitration Tournament, the Villanova Baseball Filing Day Competition, the Villanova Professional Football Negotiation Competition,  and the Fordham National Basketball Negotiation Competition. We have also participated in additional sports negotiation competitions that students have entered on their own.

  • Yes! Students can earn credit for internships or hands on experiences through practicums with law firms, teams, agents, charitable foundations  and related organizations. Students can apply to participate in the school designed Sports Law Practicum which focuses on the National Letter of Intent/Name, Image and Likeness Joint Project with the City of Philadelphia through Councilmember Isaiah Thomas’s office. In this Practicum, students will develop program material, engage in outreach and advocacy with and for student-athletes in Philadelphia area high schools, and work with City Council to further their mission set forth in the “Youth Name, Image and Likeness Protection” bill authored by Councilmember Thomas. Additionally, students may have the opportunity to assist in both writing and ushering through future legislation at the city government level.
  • Student also have opportunities to secure internships or opportunities on their own and receive credit. To do so, students must submit a Practicum Approval Form which can be found here.

  • While Temple Law does not have a dedicated sports law journal, many students have written Notes and Comments for the Temple Law Review on sports-related topics supervised by faculty in the Sports Law Program. Students can work with a faculty advisor to create their own guided research project for which they can research and write about a topic of their choosing. Faculty advisors offer guidance in selecting a topic, research strategy, writing style and editorial support, and submitting the final paper to various legal journals and broader media for publication. Student authors also contribute to news stories and developments posted on the Sports Law website.

Who We Are

Priya A. Ahmad

priya.ahmad@temple.edu
Priya A. Ahmad is a current 3L at Temple University Beasley School of Law with a strong passion for sports law. She is a Dombrowski Sports Law Scholar, a Kohn Prize recipient, and a Russell Conwell Scholar. Her primary competition sport is football, and she represents Temple on the Sports Law Negotiation Team. Priya also serves as Co-President of the Sports and Entertainment Law Society, Social Media Chair of the Alternative Dispute Resolution Society, and a Student Representative for Themis Bar Review.
Priya earned her B.A. in Politics (cum laude) with a minor in Economics from Occidental College in May 2022. While at Occidental, she served as Senior Class Senator and Interim Director of Policies for the student government, where she established the first $250,000 student government investment account and created a $10,000 emergency fund for students in crisis. She also interned for U.S. Senator Kamala D. Harris, where she conducted legislative research and drafted policy memos on health, education, and economic issues. Her undergraduate honors include Capstone Leader of the Year and multiple appearances on the Dean’s List.
Priya has gained hands-on legal and business experience through internships with Playfly Sports, the Philadelphia Flyers, and The Cigna Group.

Trevor Dunn

trevor.dunn@temple.edu

Trevor Dunn is a 2L at Temple University Beasley School of Law, originally from southeast Michigan. He is a Beasley Scholar, serves as Vice-President of the Sports and Entertainment Law Society, and competes on the Sports Law Negotiation Team. Trevor primarily competes on the Football negotiation team, driven by his interest in NFL contract structure and the role that salary cap strategy plays in shaping the league. This summer, Trevor is interning with a judge in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

 

Trevor earned his bachelor’s degree in both Anthropology and French from the University of Michigan in 2022, graduating with High Distinction. During his time at Michigan, Trevor was a member of the Student Advisory Board to the Associate Vice President of Student Life and was a Recreational Sports Supervisor, overseeing logistics for the university’s Intramural Sports programs. Trevor is deeply passionate about college athletics and has closely followed the evolving landscape of college sports finances, culminating in writing undergraduate papers on the viability of collegiate athletics. This interest also led him to enroll in Temple’s NIL Practicum.

 

Following graduation, Trevor worked for two years at a business immigration law firm in Detroit, where he managed immigration matters for multinational technology corporations. Outside of work, he coached soccer for a non-profit youth sports initiative.

John Trismen

john.trismen@temple.edu

John E. Trismen is a 3L at the Temple University Beasley School of Law. In addition to joining the Sports Law Practicum, John is very active in the Temple Sports Law Community as the current co-President and former Vice President of the Sports and Entertainment Law Society, and as the current co-Captain of the Sports Law Negotiation Team. Outside of sports, John is a co-founder and co-President of the Alternative Dispute Resolution Society and was a Staff Editor of Temple Law Review’s Volume 97 and the Temple 10-Q.

John graduated from the University of Virginia in 2019 with a dual degree in Environmental Science and Government. There, he was a key member of the university’s water polo team, serving as the team President during his senior year and leading the Cavaliers to a 3rd place finish in the Atlantic Conference. John was also the Vice President and Rush Chair of his fraternity, Sigma Pi.
After college, John worked as an environmental consultant for Booz Allen Hamilton before pivoting to the legal profession. He was a legal assistant for several litigation firms in Washington, D.C. for two and a half years, working on cases related to medical malpractice, personal injury, telecommunications, and energy law. John spent his 1L summer interning at German, Gallagher & Murtagh, PC, and his 2L summer as a Summer Associate with Weir, LLP.