NCAA

Another day, another legal challenge to the NCAA structure.

So... football players are "employees" only sometimes?

* The lawsuit filed by Harris Faulkner over the Hasbro toy named Harris Faulkner has been settled. [Jezebel]

* A look at LGBT claims in state courts. [Lambda Legal]

* The NCAA and UCLA are being sued over concussions in college football. [Los Angeles Times]

* This is a complete waste of judicial resources. [Slate]

* A look at the VP debate live tweets. [Law and More]

* Mike Pence’s terrible legacy on reproductive freedom. [Salon]

Lots of briefs filed, not many changes.

* “Even with a new Republican appointee, [Justice Clarence] Thomas is likely to remain somewhat isolated on the extreme right.” In the case of Justice Thomas, it wouldn’t even matter if Donald Trump won the presidency — he’d still be the most conservative justice in the modern history of the Supreme Court. [New York Times]

* The Supreme Court’s long conference was yesterday, and we’ll likely find out later today (or in the days to come) the cases for which the justices decided to grant certiorari for the 2016-17 term. One of those cases may be NCAA v. O’Bannon, where the question of sports amateurism for the purpose of athletes’ pay is up for debate. [CBS Sports]

* Hot on the heels of the news that Dentons dragged down revenue per lawyer rankings for the entire 2016 Global 100 thanks to its mega-merger with Dacheng, the firm had a more upbeat announcement. Partners Mike McNamara, Jeff Haidet, and Peter Wolfson have ascended to national and global leadership positions. Congrats! [Big Law Business]

* Under a new California law signed by Gov. Jerry Brown, actors may conceal their age and force websites like IMDb to remove their age from bio pages in order to shield themselves from age-based discrimination in casting. Critics of the law are calling this an attack on free speech — and it’s too little, too late for Junie Hoang. [WSJ Law Blog]

* Judge Leonard I. Garth, Third Circuit Court of Appeals jurist, RIP. [Washington Post]

* Daniel O. Bernstine, president of LSAC, RIP. [ABA Journal]

In its brief, the NFHS waxes poetic about some Leave It To Beaver era of athletics...

* If Justice Scalia had lived to July, he may have undone all of the advances of the Obama administration, which probably explains why the Republicans are so hard up about Merrick Garland’s nomination. [Slate]

* Feeling inspired by HBO’s Confirmation? Get the skinny on what it’s like to try a discrimination case. [Forensis Group]

* The Office of the Solicitor General has had quite the heavy workload this term. [Empirical SCOTUS]

* The Supreme Court won’t hear the Authors Guild appeal to the Second Circuit ruling in favor of Google for its book scanning project. [Techdirt]

* Gay republican confronts Ted Cruz over religious-freedom inspired laws. Let’s just say Cruz didn’t come off as a defender of LGBTQ rights. [Huffington Post]

* An illuminating interview with Wendy Davis, on what’s next following her defeat in the Texas Gubernatorial race. [Jezebel]

* St. Mary’s law professor David Grenardo on why the NCAA system is unfair, and as a former college football player, he knows what he is talking about. [San Antonio Express-News]

* Students at Villanova Law School got the day off to recover after Kris Jenkins’s epic buzzer beater and the school’s first NCAA men’s basketball championship in 30 years. [NBC Philadelphia]

* University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law has a great plan to help students deal with stress: puppies! [Daily Utah Chronicle]

* Tracing Mahatma Gandhi’s peace disobedience protests, which began 86 years ago this week, back to his roots as a lawyer. [Guile is Good]

* If you send a text, and the person you send it to reads it while driving, could you be found liable for an injuries they cause while driving distracted? This scenario, seemingly taken from a law school fact pattern, just might be true. [Personal Injury Attorney Blog]

* An in-depth look at how Zubik v. Burwell relates to other First Amendment free exercise cases. [Empirical SCOTUS]

* Are there actually practice pointers you can pick up from watching Better Call Saul? [Reboot Your Law Practice]

* President Obama will announce his pick to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia later this morning. Which member of the D.C. Circuit will he choose, Judge Sri Srinivasan or Judge Merrick Garland? America will find out at 11 a.m., and then the real political circus of trying to get a confirmation hearing will begin. [New York Times]

* “Republicans know they can’t get away with complete and total obstruction, so they may try to set up a double standard.” Senate Republicans have refused to fill the vacancy left on the Supreme Court left by the late Justice Antonin Scalia, but it looks like more than 30 other federal judicial nominees may have been caught in the political fray. [AP]

* After having a district court judge’s deferred compensation remedy slapped down by the Ninth Circuit, lawyers in the O’Bannon NCAA student-athlete pay case have asked the Supreme Court to grant certiorari. The lawyers involved “[feel] so strongly in the principles involved” that they don’t care if they lose their fees and costs. [USA Today]

* A small victory for a washed-up Mean Girl? Lindsay Lohan has never really had much success when it comes to suing others on the basis of likeness appropriation, but a New York judge has refused to dismiss her case against Rockstar Games over a look-alike character in Grand Theft Auto V. You go, girl! [THR, ESQ. / Hollywood Reporter]

* Per Lex Machina, after a slow 2014, patent litigation rose by 14.7 percent in 2015. What’s troubling to some lawyers, though, is that all of the action has migrated to Texas courts: “Why should this little corner that’s not particularly a hotbed of innovation have such an important role to play in patent law?” [Big Law Business / Bloomberg BNA]

* Talent agency Rebel Entertainment Partners is suing CBS, the TV station that airs “Judge Judy,” because it claims Judge Judy is taking in such a high salary that the network has been unable to dole out its contractually obligated payments. Although she’s not named in the suit, Judge Judy, full of sarcasm, says this is “hilarious.” [Variety]

* Bill Cosby may be trying to avoid a criminal trial, but even his $$$ may not be able to stop it. [Jezebel]

* Apple is taking on the FBI and it should matter to everyone. [Gizmodo]

* You know how Justice Scalia died on a hunting trip? Yeah, it was a free trip provided by someone who got a favorable Supreme Court result last year. Move along, nothing to see here. [Washington Post]

* No, you didn’t learn it in law school, but negotiation is an essential skill to lawyering. [The Anxious Lawyer]

* Quails — yup, the birds Justice Scalia was hunting when he died — react to Justice Scalia’s passing. [Medium]

* The Fair Labor Standards Act won’t be of any help to NCAA athletes trying to get paid. [USA Today]

* Are Scalia bobbleheads going up in value in the wake of the Justice’s passing? [Ebay]

Until a governing body or a court of law determines how crowdfunding impacts amateurism, recruits should proceed cautiously.

* Watch our very own Elie Mystal take on Richard Sander over affirmative action. [Huffington Post Live]

* How do you get better at holiday party small talk? Booze. Is the answer not booze? I coulda sworn the answer was booze. [Associate’s Mind]

* Zombie Baby Jesus is making trouble. That’s so like him. [CBS 12]

* Classes were certified in cases challenging the NCAA’s scholarship caps. [Chronicle of Higher Education]

* Is it even possible to hold law schools accountable anymore? [Medium]

* Is there a legal argument that Donald Trump’s campaign is a hoax? [New York Personal Injury Lawyer Blog]

Late Saturday night, while most Americans were fully embedded in their couch’s butt groove after a day of some of the year’s best college football games, a group of athletes decided to embark on the most important goal line stand of their lives.

Après O'Bannon, le deluge.

* Biglaw leaders aren’t feeling so hot about the future of the profession. What else is new? [Big Law Business / Bloomberg BNA]

* Villanova Law School whining about its fall in the U.S. News rankings after admitting it had artificially inflated its numbers. Listen, it’s this stupid fascination with U.S. News that got Villanova busted in the first place. It’s high time the school stops preening for U.S. News and starts touting its admirable position in the rankings based on what’s best for students. [Philadelphia Inquirer]

* It’s time for the Supreme Court to hear the important cases! Enough of these poor people railroaded by the system, where’s justice for disgraced former Governor Bob McDonnell? [Washington Post]

* Everything should be legal! At least when it comes to BS NCAA violations. [Adequate Man / Deadspin]

* Women make less than men when it comes to in-house work. Sort of like all other work. [Law360]

* Hillary was hailed as the big winner last night, but her biggest victory was knowing that Bernie Sanders was going to pull his punches. [Redline]

* Sara Randazzo with the Twitter observation of the day yesterday: lawyer for ex-Dewey chair Steve Davis trolled the jury with his tie pattern. [Twitter]

People who don't understand scrutiny don't understand how the NCAA lost.

Another blow to the NCAA.

The NCAA says college athletes who wager on daily fantasy sports (DFS) could lose one year eligibility because it equates playing DFS to betting on sports.

The latest example of why the NCAA needs to die.

* After closing arguments in the Dark Knight movie massacre trial, the case against accused shooter James Holmes now goes to a jury. He’s facing 165 criminal charges, and if found guilty, he may be sentenced to death. [NBC News]

* A federal magistrate judge ordered the NCAA to pay almost $46 million in legal fees and costs to lawyers representing student-athletes in their antitrust suit against the organization, and he even likened the case to Game of Thrones in his decision. This is a monumental win. [Reuters]

* Last night, SCOTUS denied a stay of execution for Mississippi death row inmate David Zink, even though his lawyers cited Justice Breyer’s recent death penalty dissent in Glossip with high hopes that the Court would act in their client’s favor. [National Law Journal]

* For your information, the gender gap in the legal profession extends far beyond pay and partnership prospects. According to a recent study by the American Bar Association, about two-thirds of all attorneys who appeared in federal civil trials were men [WSJ Law Blog]

* Going to law school in an underserved community that isn’t overflowing with lawyers is great for résumés, because the University of New Mexico School of Law is seriously bucking the trend of its students having difficulty finding jobs after graduation. [KOB 4]