Redskins' Pierre Garcon sues FanDuel on behalf of NFL players

 

Redskins' Pierre Garcon sues FanDuel on behalf of NFL players

Washington Redskins wide receiver Pierre Garcon is leading a class-action lawsuit for NFL players against daily fantasy site FanDuel, his law firms announced Friday.
 
Garcon is suing for misuse of players' names and likenesses, exploiting them without proper licenses or permissions. The lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in Maryland, notes that Garcon's name appears frequently in FanDuel commercials.
"FanDuel has taken the liberty to engage in these actions without my consent and without proper licensing rights," Garcon said in a statement. "As a result of these activities, FanDuel daily fantasy contests have shown increasing revenues leading to large profits."
 
FanDuel competitor DraftKings is not named in the suit. DraftKings has a marketing relationship with the NFL Players Association, which allows the company to put players such as Rob Gronkowski in its advertising. DraftKings does not pay the NFL or the NFLPA for the use of statistics.
 
Garcon could have a hard time making his case against FanDuel. Some precedent suggests that using stats alone for fantasy purposes is no different from putting players' names in a box score. In NBA v. Motorola and Stats Inc., a U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in 1997 that the federal copyright statute does not allow for the ownership of data.
 
The FanDuel lawsuit represents the latest legal challenge for the lucrative daily fantasy industry, which has attracted scrutiny since a multimillion-dollar advertising blitz at the start of the NFL season.
 
Garcon said he would not comment on the lawsuit further and referred questions to agent Brad Cicala.
 
ESPN's Darren Rovell and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Click to expand...