EA Sports tied to retired NFL players' suit

By Brendan Sinclair, GameSpotPosted Sep 30, 2008 2:39 pm PT

Discovery phase of class-action suit finds EA got a sweetheart deal on Hall of Famers' rights.

The NFL Players Association is facing a class-action lawsuit from retired players, and NFLPA licensee Electronic Arts is on the sidelines as the two groups square off in court.

A group of former NFLers is suing the players association over licensing deals it made, specifically an agreement with EA Sports to include Hall of Famers in the Madden series of games. According to a post on the NFL Retired Players United blog (as spotted by GamePolitics), e-mails from NFLPA representatives turned up evidence that the union made a sweetheart deal with EA that cost Hall of Fame players royalty revenue.

The blog posts an excerpt from one e-mail to an attorney at the union's Players Inc. marketing arm, in which NFLPA executive Clay Walker talks about securing a number of player rights for less than market value.

"The per player price for most of these guys was tens of thousands of dollars less than what they were guaranteed by Take Two Interactive so it's a real coup that we were able to pull this off so cheaply," the e-mail read. "You have to remember that EA's total cost is only $200,000 per year. We know that Take Two offered six-figure deals to several former NFL players so the total cost is millions below market prices."

In another e-mail supposedly from Walker, the executive says EA owes him "a huge favor" because a deal struck with the Hall of Fame "was enough to persuade Take-Two to back off its plans, leaving EA as the only professional football videogame manufacturer out there."

While Electronic Arts has an exclusive license to make NFL games, Take-Two last year attempted to launch a new series with All-Pro Football 2K8. The game sought to make up for the lack of the NFL license by including the names and likenesses of hundreds of retired gridiron legends. However, after the first installment met with lukewarm reviews and sluggish sales, the All-Pro series was benched.

57 Comments

  • mosesdg2001

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 10:36 pm PT

    2k5 was the best if not still the best football game out there. first of all it had sports center built in to it so what ever happened during the week all u had to do was push the left stick in and it showed all the highlights of the week like sports center would and you could create your own stadium music for interception, touchdowns, etc... I only play madden because it's the only thing out now. 2k was most def. better than the madden series.

  • Jimmy20000

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 6:52 pm PT

    I haven't played this game yet, but i have Madden 08 and i'm dying to play Madden 09 already!

  • Jimmy20000

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 6:51 pm PT

    I haven't played this game yrt, but I have Madden 08 and i'm already dying to play Madden 09!

  • VoltySquirrel94

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 2:29 pm PT

    @i_like_toast
    Congress has bigger things to worry about right now. Plummeting economy anyone?

  • rbop

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 2:13 pm PT

    I obviously don't agree w/ EA's business practice, and the company's sports divisions are basically monopolys... that being said anyone who thinks that 2K football is/was/or ever will be better than Madden is insane. All Pro was HORRIBLE. 2K baseball trumps the old EA series by a lot, but the football is just bad!

  • sportwarrior

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 12:36 pm PT

    I really enjoyed the All Pro game. It definitely needed to be deeper with a franchise mode, but it was a damn solid football game and reminded me of what made the 2K series so damned superior to Madden. Stupid EA.

  • Autolycus

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 12:22 pm PT

    Its the exact same example of employees should be paid more because they make the millionaire executives all the money. It'll never happen because greed rules this country. it has for the past 15 years.

  • PlanetAnyhow

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 10:23 am PT

    The bottom line here is simple; the players should get their money. The players are the reason gamers buy league-licensed products, and the players are what gives the NFLPA executives a job to do in the first place.

    In my opinion, the bigger issue here is that the NFLPA has too much control over retired players. They are retired, which technically means they aren't players, which means they shouldn't belong to the NFL PLAYERS Association anymore. In my view, for protection purposes, there should be a separate association for retired players, and there should be a system in place to allow seamless movement from one association to another (and, in Brett Favre's case, back and forth).

    As far as the issue of exclusivity goes, the issue is complex. As with any monopoly (ahem, Windows), quality has a tendency to drop somewhat, but I believe that in some sense, human nature contributes to that. So, if EA's Madden games have suffered from a quality standpoint, that's no one's fault but the makers of the games. HOWEVER, if we as gamers blindly buy EA games for reasons such as "it's EA, so it must be better than that new brand", or "they have the NFL license, so they must make the best game", then it's OUR faults that EA escapes every year making a sub-par game. To be clear: It's not our fault that they MAKE a poor quality game, but if we buy it every year regardless of quality, then why should they improve? The same goes with every monopoly, I believe. If everyone suddenly switched to Linux, Microsoft would eventually have to listen to users and improve the quality of Windows if they want their share of the market back. So, the only way to get better Madden games from the owners of these exclusivity rights is to STOP buying the games until quality is back where we believe it should be.

  • Henninger

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 9:18 am PT

    Y is every1 hatin on All-Pro Football 2K8? That game's gameplay wuz pretty much the same as NFL 2K5. & a lot of people consider that game as 1 of the greatest football games of all time. So now that it doesnt have NFL teams & current players its garbage? Doesn't make sense 2 me. Madden in my opinion has always been overrated. The gameplay just seems fake 2 me compared 2 Take-Two's. & on top of that Madden is the same game every year!

  • drakron

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 8:49 am PT

    Why? Nothing stops anyone to make a Football video game ... just like nobody can stop anyone to start up a new Football League.

    EA have the "exclusive" in the sense they have the exclusive use of the NFL license, the fact the public buys it BECAUSE it have a NFL is the public fault.

    After all, EA have the FIFA series and that does not stop Konami and others to put out their own soccer games.

  • i_like_toast

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 8:34 am PT

    I wish congress would step up and prevent this exclusive deal bull. This deal has done nothing but stop competition which results in half-assed games for us. Both football and baseball games see this.

  • klugenbeel

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 8:24 am PT

    Sounds likes some insider trading has ben going on....rip away that NFL deal from EA so Take 2 can get back in the game...since their game was better at the time.

  • jahrv76

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 8:22 am PT

    "so much for your high regard of NFL 2K Sports... maybe their games used to be good, not anymore"

    Yeah, I guess that makes two companies that can't make a good football game.

  • xbox4life76

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 8:06 am PT

    Somebody at the NFLPA is going to get caught with some extra $$$ in his pockets while it truly belongs to the former NFL'ers. The principle is the players make the game, not the NFLPA...EA is no guilty party in this either.

  • WardCleaver02

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 7:23 am PT

    Something about those e-mail excerpts seems fishy. They do not sound like professionals corresponding.

  • makemeweak

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 7:04 am PT

    Just because they got the licenses on the cheap doesn't mean they got them unfairly or illegally. We'll have to see more details on the suit to see if it has merit.

  • mrjasler

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 7:03 am PT

    "However, after the first installment met with lukewarm reviews and sluggish sales, the All-Pro series was benched. "

    so much for your high regard of NFL 2K Sports... maybe their games used to be good, not anymore

  • phase4illini

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 6:57 am PT

    I was never a fan of EA's ability to gain league exclusivity. I have little doubt that the lack of competition has allowed EA to sit on their laurels on their Madden series. But on a more serious point of contention, with all the other shady dealings going on between the NFLPA and the retired players right now, this cries out as the shadiest of them all. On the face of all this, it looks like EA and the NFLPA made a sweet little hush-hush deal to keep retired players from receiving the royalties that they should otherwise be entitled. The fact that this occurs concurrently with the issue that the NFLPA has been taking steps to stave off better medical support for retired players who, in most cases, gave their bodies for the game, is unsettling.
    Before we jump back on the "professional athletes are paid too much" bandwagon (one that I agree with to an extent), a majority of retired players pushing for better medical compensation from the league are those that played before free agency, where the big money contracts didn't exist as they do today. And even so, the big name players are usually the only ones with the excessive contracts, and so far, that's been nothing but fueled by the outrageous rookie draft contracts, another issue that the NFLPA needs to bend on to the league. No rookie player should be making millions in the NFL before they've even played in a real game.
    So I got a little off-topic, but in the end, I hope that EA and the NFLPA get their P P’s slapped for this seemingly shady deal.

  • MarcJL31

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 6:25 am PT

    I agree with both arguments from people below. On one hand, professional players complain so much about how much they are getting paid when they make millions playing a sport. A job they should be blessed to have in the first place. ON the other hand, I hope EA does get some fire over this because it is sad that a company has to literally buy out the competition or franchise because they don't want to have to actually invest the time to make a guy that can compete with other developers.

  • hunter8man

    Posted Oct 1, 2008 5:21 am PT

    EA deserves whatever they get from this. ESPN did a special on retired NFL players a few years back, and Mike Ditka called out the NFLPA for screwing them over, and EA is doing the same. I wish they ruled to break EA's NFL exclusive rights, or start paying them more. Then again, I would be content if the Wii version of Tecmo Bowl ends up as fun and popular as the original versions to show you don't need the NFL license to make a fun football game.

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