From the blog Shutdown Corner: It's a big week in the life of Andrew Luck, who will be the No. 1 draft pick, but it won't be 100 percent pleasant. Amidst...
It's a big week in the life of Andrew Luck, who will be the No. 1 draft pick, but it won't be 100 percent pleasant. Amidst the pre-draft publicity tour, the draft night celebration and all the upcoming press obligations in Indianapolis, he'll also have to worry about a lawsuit. He's being sued by Leaf Trading Cards.
The Leaf people produced a few Andrew Luck cards, using a picture of him at the 2008 U.S. Army All-American Bowl, a high school All-Star game. Luck's people sent them a cease-and-desist letter, saying that they don't have the legal right to profit from an image of Luck. The Leaf people say they do indeed have the right to use images from the All-American Bowl. Now they're suing Luck.
Here's a snippet of a press release from Leaf,via PFT:
"Leaf Trading Cards is disappointed that it was forced to submit this matter to the judicial system," lawyer O. Luke Davis, III said in a press release. "We are confident, however, that the court will find that Leaf has the right to produce and sell the Andrew Luck trading cards."
I still don't get why they're suing Luck. Couldn't they just ignore the cease-and-desist and keep doing what they're doing, and if they eventually have to defend themselves from a Luck lawsuit, then just do that? Isn't that how this typically works? If anything, I think Andrew Luck should sue them for putting his name in the same sentence as "Leaf" so close to the NFL draft.
Perhaps it's the case that the Leaf people saw an opportunity to get their name in the newspaper and pounced on it. There's more than one way to make money off of Andrew Luck's name, I guess. One just hopes that they pay closer attention to their spelling in their legal documents than they do with their trading cards. Oof. That's embarrassing. Call more attention to that, Leaf Company.
