Sports

For over half a century, Weil has partnered with stakeholders across the dynamic sports industry to navigate risks and opportunities associated with the rapid expansion and growth of the sector. Our cross-disciplinary domestic and international platform has played a leading role in countless industry-changing engagements, including seminal antitrust cases that helped achieve free agency and fair competition across the industry, IP disputes that have yielded important rulings on athlete name, image, and likeness rights, and major deals and litigations that transformed the leagues we watch and the ways we interact with them.

Notable Representations, Key Contacts

Weil is uniquely situated to provide sports-industry clients with full-spectrum counsel on their most important, high-stakes matters:

  • Longstanding and broad-based relationships with players’ unions, pro athletes and their agents and marketing teams, and industry-adjacent stakeholders, including media, broadcast, sports betting, and entertainment companies.
  • Deep industry expertise in important areas that feature most prominently in sports-related transactions and disputes, including antitrust and intellectual property law, employment and labor law, internal investigations, and acquisitions and dispositions of professional sports franchises.
  • A robust international team that provides our clients with a combination of local-market knowledge and a high-level understanding of global economic, legislative, and legal opportunities and risks, which together enable us to advance our clients’ short-term goals and long-term interests, particularly with the rapid expansion of cross-border investment and activity. 

Some of our notable groundbreaking matters have included:

Washington State University and Oregon State University

Minor League Baseball Teams

NBA All-Star Zion Williamson and Creative Artists Agency

National Women’s Soccer League Players Association

CBS Sports

DirecTV

Our notable areas of expertise include:

  • Litigation and Investigations: Weil’s Litigation team works collaboratively with clients to help achieve groundbreaking results. Drawing on our expertise in complex commercial litigation, high-stakes investigations, and global antitrust law, Weil routinely counsels clients throughout the industry, including professional sports franchises, superstar athletes, labor unions, and talent management firms in high-stakes commercial, employment, IP, and antitrust disputes in both state and federal jurisdictions, as well as in connection with sensitive investigations that play out in front of regulators and the press.
  • Corporate/Restructuring: Weil provides market-leading legal services in acquisitions, strategic investments and transactions, reorganizations, and financings for clients across the global sports industry. Whether the need involves adapting to the dynamic sports media landscape or representing private capital in purchasing or investing in highly coveted global sports properties, Weil stands ready to counsel clients where it matters. Weil also has extensive experience advising clients on broadcasting rights, naming rights, sponsorship and other sports-related contractual arrangements that generate value for sports clients and their brand partners.
  • Tax and Executive Compensation: Our global tax practice enables us to work with clients and private equity sponsors to navigate the challenges of domestic and international transactions. Weil's tax expertise enables us to understand the intricacies and nuances surrounding transactions involving global sports properties, as well as executive compensation matters that are critical to every sports transaction.

Key Contacts

Drew Tulumello

Drew Tulumello

Partner

Washington, D.C.


David Avery-Gee

David Avery-Gee

Partner

London


Yehudah Buchweitz

Yehudah L. Buchweitz

Partner

New York


Arianna Scavetti

Arianna Scavetti

Partner

Washington, D.C.

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According to clients, Weil’s sports law practice “has a very strong team with a diverse range of strengths. The group is very impressive.”

Chambers USA 2024

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