ATLANTA — Student athletes who sign sponsorship contracts in high school would not be stuck with those contract terms after graduation, under legislation approved unanimously Wednesday by the Georgia House of Representatives.
House Bill 383 would nullify contracts to use a student’s name, image or likeness soon after the student either earns a diploma or leaves their high school for some other reason. It is an attempt to address a perceived power imbalance between the families of teenagers and the sports industry.
A contract termination law is needed to avoid exploitation, said Rep. Brent Cox, R-Dawsonville, the chief co-sponsor of the bill. Too many students have found themselves locked into exploitative contracts in perpetuity, he said.
“It protects these student athletes from having these unending contracts at the collegiate and the NFL level,” Cox said, adding that he’d heard of agents collecting as much as a tenth of a former student athlete’s earnings after the student went pro.
The bill had bipartisan backing, with former Atlanta Falcons player Rep. Dewey McClain, D-Lawrenceville, signing on.
Rep. Chris Erwin, R-Homer, a retired school superintendent who now chairs the House Education Committee, sponsored the measure too.
HB 383, which now heads to the Senate, also would not allow schools to prevent students from obtaining agents or other legal representation, and it would impose restrictions on contract terms.
It would prohibit student athletes endorsing or promoting weapons or vice products, including alcohol, tobacco, drugs, gambling and pornography.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat, an initiative of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.