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4 

NATIONAL COLLEGIATE ATHLETIC ASSN. v. ALSTON 

KAVANAUGH, J., concurring 

Texaco Inc. v. Dagher, 547 U. S. 1, 5 (2006).  Businesses like 
the NCAA cannot avoid the consequences of price-fixing la-
bor by incorporating price-fixed labor into the definition of 
the product.  Or to put it in more doctrinal terms, a monop-
sony  cannot  launder  its  price-fixing  of  labor  by  calling  it 
product definition. 
  The  bottom  line  is  that  the  NCAA  and  its  member  col-
leges are suppressing the pay of student athletes who col-
lectively generate billions of dollars in revenues for colleges 
every year.  Those enormous sums of money flow to seem-
ingly everyone except the student athletes.  College presi-
dents,  athletic  directors,  coaches,  conference  commission-
ers,  and  NCAA  executives  take  in  six-  and  seven-figure 
salaries.  Colleges build lavish new facilities.  But the stu-
dent  athletes  who  generate  the  revenues,  many  of  whom 
are African American and from lower-income backgrounds, 
end up with little or nothing.  See Brief for African Ameri-
can Antitrust Lawyers as Amici Curiae 13–17. 
  Everyone agrees that the NCAA can require student ath-
letes  to  be  enrolled  students  in  good  standing.    But  the 
NCAA’s business model of using unpaid student athletes to 
generate billions of dollars in revenue for the colleges raises 
serious questions under the antitrust laws.  In particular, 
it is highly questionable whether the NCAA and its member 
colleges can justify not paying student athletes a fair share 
of  the  revenues  on  the  circular  theory  that  the  defining 
characteristic of college sports is that the colleges do not pay 
student athletes.  And if that asserted justification is una-
vailing, it is not clear how the NCAA can legally defend its 
remaining compensation rules. 
  If it turns out that some or all of the NCAA’s remaining 
compensation  rules  violate  the  antitrust  laws,  some  diffi-
cult  policy  and  practical  questions would  undoubtedly  en-
sue.  Among them: How would paying greater compensation 
to  student  athletes  affect  non-revenue-raising  sports?  
Could student athletes in some sports but not others receive