NFL Players Sued by Yahoo Over Control of Statistics

The National Football League Players Association was sued by Yahoo! Inc. over control of the players’ names, pictures and voices that Yahoo uses in its fantasy football game.

Yahoo, owner of the second most-used search engine in the U.S., filed the complaint June 1 in federal court in Minneapolis. The Sunnyvale, California-based company claims the NFL players organization threatened to sue if it doesn’t pay royalties for using publicly available biographical information.

"Yahoo, like other fantasy football game providers, tracks, compiles, and posts" NFL player statistics, Yahoo said in the complaint.

The company asked for a court order preventing the players from controlling their statistics or likenesses, claiming the organization "may not continue to extract money from Yahoo for the use of this publicly available information."

The NFL Players Association granted National Football League Players Inc. the "exclusive worldwide right" to license the players’ biographical information, according to the complaint.

Yahoo said in the suit that in previous football seasons it licensed the information from NFL Players Inc. The most recent agreement expired in March, and Yahoo, relying on a similar case brought by a unit of CBS Corp., claims it no longer needs such authorization from NFL Players Inc.

Nicole Addison, a Yahoo spokeswoman, said in an e-mailed statement that the company declined to comment on the case.

Joanna Comfort, a spokeswoman for the NFL Players Association, didn’t immediately return a call seeking comment after regular business hours yesterday.

The case is Yahoo v. National Football League Players Association, 09-1272, U.S. District Court, District of Minnesota (Minneapolis).

(Published by Bloomberg - June 4, 2009)