NFL and Reebok Win Legal Challenge Over Team Logo Hats

The National Football League and shoe and apparel company Reebok International, Inc. did not violate antitrust laws when they engaged in an exclusive licensing deal to make hats with team logos on them, according to a federal appeals court ruling. The challenge by cap maker American Needle Inc. was rejected by the U.S. Court of Appeals in Chicago. As reported by Bloomberg News, the ruling allows the NFL, and other sports leagues, to enter exclusive agreements without breaking the Sherman Act: Rejecting cap maker American Needle Inc.'s argument that the NFL and its franchises illegally conspired to restrain trade, the Chicago-based U.S. Court of Appeals found the league speaks with one voice in its marketing.``NFL teams are best described as a single source of economic power when promoting NFL football through licensing the teams' intellectual property,'' U.S. Circuit Judge Michael Kanne wrote today for the three-judge panel. American Needle, Inc. sued the league...