The NCAA's appeal of U.S. District Court Judge Claudia Wilken's ruling in the Ed O'Bannon case is set to see the courtroom Tuesday afternoon.
According to the Los Angeles Times, a three-judge panel at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, Calif. will hear arguments Tuesday afternoon. Wilken's ruling was in O'Bannon's favor, but contained certain concessions.
For example, Wilken ruled the NCAA must loosen its stringent restrictions on student-athletes earning compensation of any kind. However, she put a limit on what they may earn though licensing revenue share and ruled the funds must be kept from them until they leave college.
O'Bannon initially sued the NCAA and two other companies for unfairly using his name, image and likeness (NIL) without compensating him, ESPN reported. His team later achieved class-action status to try to get the NCAA to change their ways rather than pursue individual damages.
Wilken's ruling sided with O'Bannon, who sued the NCAA for violating anti-trust laws, though she decided against allowing student-athletes to sign commercial endorsements. Despite the ruling's various concessions, the NCAA vowed to defend their strict model of amateurism in appealing the decision.
The ruling, which if upheld will not take affect until July, 2016, also allows individual schools to provide student-athletes with full cost of attendance scholarships. The Power 5- the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12 and SEC - and other athletic conferences are on record as favoring such scholarships.
The NCAA retained Seth Waxman, a former U.S. Solicitor General, to present their case to the panel, Reuters reported. While many pundits and public figures have lifted their voices to criticize the NCAA for making billions of dollars while neglecting to pay student-athletes a penny, Walt Disney Co and CBS Corp are making their support known.
"The commercial pressures of college sports present (and have always presented) the risk that an avocation will become a profession and that athletics will become untethered from the academic experience," Waxman wrote in a court filing. "But amateurs who are paid are no longer amateurs."
