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00:00The Major League Baseball Players Union, apparently, I mean, to me, Matt, it feels like, woke
00:08up one day, went online, saw their players, you know, listed on their sites with pictures
00:15and things like that, and said, wait a minute here.
00:17They're making all this money, and we're not.
00:19So are they allowed to do this?
00:22Is this a legitimate lawsuit?
00:24Are they looking for a settlement here?
00:26Tell us more about it.
00:27Yeah, well, Craig, you know as well as I do, are they allowed to do this, and is it a legitimate
00:32lawsuit are two totally different things in the U.S.
00:35Look, here, you're right, it did have a bit of a feeling of, they woke up and saw this,
00:42right?
00:43Because it's not necessarily new for these four sportsbooks, Bet365, DraftKings, FanDuel,
00:48and Underdog.
00:49Remember, Underdog does have a sportsbook in North Carolina, even though they are primarily
00:53daily fantasy sports focused.
00:56But it's not that they started using player pictures in 2024.
01:02It's just that now the MLBPI, the MLB Players Inc., which is the arm of the players that
01:10basically licenses their name, image, and likeness, they are saying, you know, look,
01:17these agreements that we have with, that the league has with you guys, doesn't necessarily
01:22cover this.
01:25It's interesting when you read through, there are two separate lawsuits, Craig, one in New
01:30York and one in Pennsylvania, which may wind up being something that's argued over back
01:35and forth.
01:36But it's interesting when you read them, the two lawsuits are basically identical, saying
01:41that, look, these pictures are being used on there, and do you really need to see Bryce
01:48Harper's face next to a prop bet that's saying, you know, will he hit over 0.5 home runs or
01:55not tonight?
01:56Do you really need to see his face to know, isn't seeing his name enough to know who you're
02:02betting on?
02:03And then they liken it to NFL.
02:07And if you look, they include screenshots, and I went on and looked myself, and, you
02:12know, Jalen Hurts' prop didn't have Jalen Hurts' picture next to it.
02:16In fact, none of the NFL props had the specific player's picture next to it.
02:22Now, you have to wonder why that is, right?
02:25I have not looked at any of the contracts that are involved in this.
02:30It could be something as simple as, maybe the NFL made it very clear that that was not
02:36to happen, and maybe the MLB, the books thought they had a little more leeway here and there.
02:42But look, NIL rights, how long have we been talking about those now?
02:47Everybody knows how valuable they are.
02:50And the MLB PI is saying, look, Bryce Harper's face, you know, all these players' faces,
02:58this is valuable, and you can't just use it just because.
03:03They want to be compensated to be using their likeness in this name, in this way.
03:08It also pointed out that Underdog was using the names, images, and likenesses on social
03:15media accounts.
03:16So, they said, you know, now you're not just promoting, it's not informational when you
03:21go to that point, it's promotional when you get to that point, and the players should
03:26be paid for that.
03:27So, we're going to keep an eye on this.
03:29The two jurisdictions is interesting, Craig.
03:33Bendul and Underdog are both located in New York, so New York Supreme Court has jurisdiction
03:39over that.
03:40Bet365 is an international company, and DraftKings is based out of Massachusetts.
03:47The lawsuit is in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, and they say that they can do
03:52that under state law because a substantial part of the events took place within the court's
03:58jurisdiction.
03:59I'm obviously not a legal expert, but I would think that they're going to come back and
04:05say, you know, this is a little bit of jurisdiction shopping here.
04:08So, I don't know that we'll get off to a quick start in any of these, but no update yet from
04:16either of these books pushing back.
04:18Nobody wanted to comment.
04:19Some didn't even respond to the request for comment.
04:21You know how that goes.
04:22Of course.
04:23So, we'll be watching this, we'll be seeing what happens, but it is interesting that all
04:28of these books clearly saw a difference between what they could do with MLB and what they
04:33could do with NFL, and where does that idea stem from, I think, is what we really need
04:39to find out here.