Dear Mr. Clarett:

There must be much on your mind these days, what with your automobile incident, the suggestion of test-taking fraud and the resulting investigations by Ohio State University and the National Collegiate Athletic Association. It must be difficult to think clearly with all this noise. I thought I'd write to help you think about your situation and to offer you a larger perspective.

You have considered quitting college football and playing professionally. Although you say you hope to play for the Buckeyes this season, I think, instead, you should consider challenging the N.F.L.'s rule that prohibits you from playing in the league before you have been out of high school for three seasons.

After all, you had a fantastic season in 2002-3. Your team won the national championship, and you were its outstanding player, even as a freshman. You rushed for more than 1,200 yards and scored 16 touchdowns. Plainly, if you could just get work in the N.F.L., you would make millions of dollars.

And let's face it, you can't make anything playing at Ohio State. The N.C.A.A. forbids it. Heck, you can't even get any of the money from the sale of the shirt with your name on it!

The trouble is, not one N.F.L. franchise will hire you, despite your unquestioned ability. In America! Bizarre. The N.F.L. teams have agreed not to hire you -- even if you need the money or don't really want to go to college. This is similar to all the major American music producers refusing to record the Beatles until each member had finished three years of college.

Why doesn't the N.F.L. want to hire you? There are probably many reasons. For one thing, it makes sense for most young men to gain maturity and seasoning before attempting to play football professionally. Who wants to see more unfortunate stories of young men who leave college early to play a professional sport, only to fall short of their goal and, in the meantime, give up a chance at a free college degree?

I strongly suspect, however, there are less benign, and more commercial, reasons. The N.F.L. has a financial interest in helping the college sports industry flourish. After all, they have a symbiotic relationship: college football constitutes the N.F.L.'s farm system. (This, of course, is unlike baseball and hockey, which have professional farm teams that pay their players.) Naturally, the N.F.L. owners want to keep their feeder system strong, especially because it is such an excellent, cost-free way to develop players. And what better way to keep college football vibrant than to keep you carrying the ball for O.S.U.?

Can they do this? Not if you fight it. Despite the fact this system is almost certainly unlawful, the N.F.L. has had it for more than 70 years. Here are a few highlights of its history.

In 1983, Herschel Walker was playing at the University of Georgia. Like you, he was a phenomenal running back. As a freshman and a sophomore, he was a consensus all-American. As a junior, he won the Heisman Trophy. Even after all that, he could not get a job in the N.F.L. because at that time the league did not sign college players until their class had been graduated. There was much talk of his challenging the N.F.L.'s rule, but instead Walker played in the new United States Football League before moving to the N.F.L., where he enjoyed a long career. Still, the N.F.L. maintained its rule, and many other talented underclassmen were foreclosed from entering the league early.

College basketball players had earlier challenged similar rules in the N.B.A., and those rules crumbled (as is now obvious by the drafting and signing of your friend LeBron James). There hasn't been a credible challenge to the N.F.L. rule, however, for many years. Who wants to start a lawsuit? They can be long, expensive and emotionally trying. But your case, I believe, would have an excellent chance of success.

The Sherman Antitrust Act forbids ''contracts, combinations and conspiracies in restraint of trade.'' Here, the N.F.L. owners have agreed not to hire you, and their agreement, obviously, restrains your ability to trade your services for payment.

Under the law, certain ''reasonable'' restraints may be permitted, but the N.F.L. owners would have to show their rule has a pro-competitive effect. This they cannot do. Their rule does not help competition; it only stifles it. And their benign reasons -- safeguarding the maturity of players or protecting their health -- are not excuses under the Sherman Act.

They know their agreement is illegal, but it means a lot to them. Realizing there was only one potential path to preserving their rule, they took it. Unfortunately for them, but fortunately for you and others like you, this desperation play -- a long heave into the end zone -- won't work either. Let me explain.

Like many employees in America, N.F.L. players are organized into a union, the National Football League Players Association, which represents those players in collective bargaining. Unions, by their nature and purpose, seek better wages and working conditions for their members and sometimes go on strike, which is, itself, a combination in restraint of trade. Also, unions often negotiate agreements with employers, like seniority systems, that reduce competition. So, if unions and collective bargaining are to exist in America, some exemption from the antitrust laws is necessary.

Because of this basic conflict between antitrust and labor law, the Supreme Court has created the limited, but important, labor exemption to the antitrust laws. Under this doctrine, certain otherwise anticompetitive labor-management agreements are permitted. In this case, the N.F.L. said to the union, ''Let's put this into the collective-bargaining contract, take advantage of the labor exemption, and save our otherwise illegal draft-eligibility system.''

The union would accept this proposal because it prevents people like you from competing for the limited number of N.F.L. roster spots, thereby maximizing employment opportunities for current, dues-paying members in the players association.

The Supreme Court has made it abundantly clear, however, that although businesses and unions, like the N.F.L. and the players association, may restrain themselves, they cannot primarily restrain others, like you, who are not part of their relationship. In this case, they are conspiring to exclude you, a stranger to their relationship, from competing. This is illegal and not permitted by the labor exemption. In short, if you challenge the N.F.L.'s agreement not to draft you, you would have an excellent chance of ultimately prevailing.

Lawsuits, of course, can take a long time, but keep in mind that under the antitrust laws, successful plaintiffs are entitled to treble damages -- three times the amount they really lost. Imagine that paycheck!



Professor of Law, Michigan State University

DCL College of Law

Photo: Ohio State's Maurice Clarett can't play in the N.F.L. until he has been out of high school for three years. (Photo by Associated Press)