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UAAA Summit reinvigorates agent oversight

After a day-long summit, leaders from state agencies, professional athletics and the NCAA identified additional opportunities to collaboratively investigate and enforce violations of agent laws. Knowing the threats to the integrity of collegiate athletes, the leaders left the summit committed to collaboration, education and enforcement of the Uniform Athlete Agent Act (UAAA). 

“As the world of collegiate athletics evolves, it’s important to make sure laws and NCAA rules remain relevant and enforceable,” said Rachel Newman Baker, NCAA managing director of enforcement. “For the first time, we gathered the people who enforce the UAAA, people who are impacted by the law and NCAA representatives for an open dialogue about the current trends in agent activity among collegiate athletics.”

While agents operate under a national law, 42 states have adopted the Uniform Athlete Agent Act to allow for the uniform registration, certification and criminal history disclosure of agents working with student-athletes.

After reviewing the history of the UAAA, the group discussed the many threats facing student-athlete agent activity, including the challenges presented by unscrupulous runners and outside third parties. Runners are individuals that serve as a conduit between top prospective student-athletes and agents. While these individuals are not under the jurisdiction of the NCAA or professional players associations, they are covered under the UAAA enforced by the states.

While uniformity is a key benefit of the act, many states tailor the law to fit within their legal system. During the summit, representatives from state attorneys general and secretaries of state offices shared how they have amended the law. Agents in attendance gave participants an inside look at the day-to-day implications of how the law affects their operations.

“We all know that when an agent operates outside of the law, a university’s reputation and financial standing can be impacted greatly. In order to avoid these implications, enforcing the UAAA is paramount,” said Brad Phelps, Arkansas chief deputy attorney general. “The summit gave us an opportunity to share what the state of Arkansas is doing to enforce the UAAA and learn from other states and organizations about the challenges they are facing and how we can all collaborate to enforce the act.”

As ideas were shared, the group came to a consensus that moving forward they must continue to find new ways to collaborate and share information to help each other understand the current landscape.

“It’s important that states, professional leagues and players associations and the NCAA continue to find new ways to work together to penalize agents that operate outside of the laws,” said Baker. “Just today, we discussed ways to become smarter investigators by increasing the amount of outreach and education, involving local law enforcement agencies and encouraging collaboration.”

In addition to states monitoring and changing enforcement to keep up with new trends, the NCAA is also considering updates to its agent legislation, updating the current definition of an agent and creating the NCAA Agent Registration Program.