Reggie Bush sues USC, Pac-12 and NCAA to seek NIL compensation from football career 2 decades ago

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Reggie Bush sues USC, Pac-12 and NCAA to seek NIL compensation from football career 2 decades ago

2024-09-24 02:49 Last Updated At：05:21

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Former Southern California football star Reggie Bush has filed a lawsuit against his school, the NCAA and the Pac-12 in a bid to recoup money made on his name, image and likeness during his career with the Trojans two decades ago.

In a brief news release from Bush's attorneys announcing the filing Monday, the Heisman Trophy-winning tailback's representatives claim he should be paid “to address and rectify ongoing injustices stemming from the exploitation of Reggie Bush’s name, image, and likeness during his tenure as a USC football player.”

“This case is not just about seeking justice for Reggie Bush," attorney Evan Selik said in a statement. "It’s about setting a precedent for the fair treatment of all college athletes. Our goal is to rectify this injustice and pave the way for a system where athletes are rightfully recognized, compensated and treated fairly for their contributions.”

Bush was one of the most exciting players in recent college football history during his three years at USC from 2003-05 while winning two national titles and the Heisman. He went on to an 11-year NFL career.

Bush forfeited his Heisman in 2010 after USC was hit with massive sanctions partly related to Bush’s dealings with two aspiring sports marketers. The Heisman Trust restored the honor earlier this year and returned the trophy to Bush, citing fundamental changes in the structure of college athletics over the past 14 years.

Bush is still pursuing the separate defamation lawsuit he filed against the NCAA last year over the governing body’s 2021 characterization of the circumstances that led to Bush’s troubles.

It's unclear how the new lawsuit will affect Bush's relationship with USC, which had been particularly warm this year.

The school was ordered to disassociate from Bush for 10 years after the 2010 NCAA ruling, but USC had welcomed back Bush and hailed the return of his Heisman Trophy while returning his No. 5 to its place of honor among USC's eight banners for its Heisman winners on the Peristyle at the Coliseum. Bush was scheduled to lead the current Trojans out of the Coliseum tunnel at an undetermined game later this season.

“We appreciate that the new administration at USC is trying to pick up the pieces of the former administrations’ unjust and improper handling of Reggie Bush," Levi McCathern, the attorney also handling Bush's separate lawsuit against the NCAA. "However, the delay in fixing this speaks volumes.”

USC didn't immediately return a request from The Associated Press for comment on Bush's new filing.

Bush is only the latest former athlete to seek compensation through the courts this year for their prior athletic careers under the new rules in college athletics.

Denard Robinson and Braylon Edwards were among several former Michigan stars who sued the NCAA and the Big Ten Network earlier this month. In June, a group of 10 players on NC State's 1983 NCAA championship-winning basketball team sued the NCAA and the Collegiate Licensing Company to seek compensation for use of their names, images and likenesses.

The NCAA and major college conferences are currently attempting to settle three antitrust lawsuits related to NIL compensation for athletes. There is a settlement agreement in place to pay $2.78 billion to hundreds of thousands of college athletes.

The NCAA changed its rules in 2021 to allow athletes to make money through sponsorship and endorsement deals after fiercely fighting against it for decades.

AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-football-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-football

Israel-Hamas war latest: Israeli strikes on Gaza kill 7; Hezbollah fires scores of rockets at Israel

2024-09-24 17:13 Last Updated At：17:20

Palestinian officials say Israel’s strikes early Tuesday killed at least seven people in Gaza’s southern city of Khan Younis. At least 15 others, including women and children, were injured in the strikes, they said.

Israel’s military says it will do “whatever is necessary” to push Hezbollah away from Lebanon’s border with Israel. Israel and Hezbollah have been trading fire since the Israel-Hamas war began. On Monday, Israel launched hundreds of airstrikes in southern and eastern Lebanon, killing nearly 500 people and wounding more than 1,600 others.

Thousands of people fled southern Lebanon, jamming the main highway to Beirut in the biggest exodus since the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war.

It's a staggering one-day toll for a country still reeling from a deadly attack on communication devices the week before. Lebanon blamed the attacks on Israel, but Israel did not confirm or deny its responsibility.

Hezbollah launched more than 100 projectiles toward Israel on Monday, the military said, reaching deep into Israel including around the northern city of Haifa and parts of the occupied West Bank. Most of the missiles were intercepted but two people were lightly injured from falling shrapnel in northern Israel.

Here’s the latest:

JERUSALEM — Israel’s military said that 100 rockets had been fired from Lebanon into northern Israel since the early hours of Tuesday morning, setting several fires and damaging buildings in the country’s north in the second day of much-intensified hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah.

The rockets came in five volleys throughout the morning, the largest of them containing 50 rockets toward the Upper Galilee area. The military said it had struck the launchers where the rockets were fired. Another heavily-targeted area was southeast of the Israeli city of Haifa.

Rocket sirens blared throughout the morning in the country’s north. Video circulating on Israeli media showed explosions on a highway, with drivers pulling over and lying on the ground next to their vehicles.

Galilee Medical Center, a northern Israel hospital, said that two patients arrived to the hospital with minor head injuries from a rocket falling near their car. Several others were being treated for light wounds from running to shelters and traffic accidents when alarms sounded.

Hezbollah has been sending heavy volleys of rockets into Israel as Israel intensifies its operation in Lebanon. In Monday, Israeli strikes killed nearly 500 people, Lebanese health officials say, and Israel’s military ordered the south of the country evacuated.

BEIRUT — Lebanese families displaced from villages farther south slept in shelters hastily set up in schools in Beirut and the coastal city of Sidon. Some who did not find shelter elsewhere slept in cars and parks and on the seaside corniche.

Monday’s heavy bombardment sent thousands fleeing from south Lebanon. Hotels in Beirut were quickly booked to capacity and apartments in the mountains surrounding the capital were snapped up by families seeking safe accommodations.

Some offered up empty apartments or rooms in their houses in social media posts, while volunteers set up a kitchen at an empty gas station in Beirut to cook meals for the displaced.

In the eastern city of Baalbek, the state-run National News Agency reported that lines formed at bakeries and gas stations as residents rushed to stock up on essential supplies in anticipation of another round of strikes on Tuesday.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Data from fire-tracking satellites used by the United States showed the wide range of Israeli airstrikes that target southern Lebanon, an Associated Press analysis Tuesday showed.

NASA’s Fire Information for Resource Management System typically is used by experts to track wildfires across rural areas of the U.S. However, they also can be used to track the flashes and burning that follow airstrikes. That’s particularly true when an airstrike ignites flammable material on the ground, like munitions or fuel.

On Monday, Israel launched hundreds of airstrikes in southern and eastern Lebanon, killing nearly 500 people and wounding more than 1,600 others. Thousands of people fled southern Lebanon, jamming the main highway to Beirut in the biggest exodus since the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war.

Data from Monday show significant fires breaking out across southern Lebanon, stretching from the border with Israel as far north as Mashghara in the Bekaa Valley, some 20 kilometers (more than 10 miles) from the border. The area of the strikes is over 1,700 square kilometers (650 square miles).

There were several areas that showed multiple, intense fires. One was near the southern coastal town of Naqoura, which hosts a base for the United Nations peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon known as UNIFIL. Others were in rural areas or villages.

Since its creation at the start of Israel’s occupation of Lebanon from 1982 to 2000, the Shiite militia Hezbollah is believed to have stockpiled weapons and missiles throughout southern Lebanon as a deterrent to Israel.

JERUSALEM — The United States Embassy in Jerusalem has restricted American government employees from traveling to Israel’s north after a heavy exchange of fire between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group.

The embassy said Tuesday that employees require an armored vehicle and prior approval to travel to a large region of the north that includes the bustling coastal city of Haifa.

The U.S. State Department meanwhile urged American citizens to leave the country, where Israeli strikes killed nearly 500 people on Monday.

DEIR-Al-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Palestinian officials say Israel’s strikes early Tuesday killed at least seven people in Gaza’s southern city of Khan Younis. At least 15 others, including women and children, were injured in the strikes, they said.

The civil defense said the dead include five people who were killed in a strike on the Abu Harb family house in the Qizan al-Najjar area. The strike also wounded at least 10 others, it said.

Another strike hit a house in the Tahlia area in Khan Younis, killing at least two people and wounding five others, according to the rescue service. The casualties from both strikes were confirmed in hospital records in Khan Younis.

Israel says it tries to avoid harming civilians but rarely comments on individual strikes.

Gaza’s Health Ministry says over 41,000 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the war. It does not say how many were fighters, but says a little over half were women and children.

The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting around 250. Around 100 of the captives are still being held in Gaza, and a third of them are believed to be dead.

Airlines in the United Arab Emirates, a key East-West travel hub, canceled flight Tuesday to Lebanon over the ongoing cross-border fire between Israel and Hezbollah.

Long-haul carriers Emirates and Etihad canceled flights, as did FlyDubai, the low-cost carrier.

The United Arab Emirates, which reached a diplomatic recognition deal with Israel in 2020, is home to a large Lebanese population.

Egypt’s flagship airliner also canceled its flights to Lebanon on Tuesday. EgyptAir operates two flights daily between Cairo and Beirut. It said the cancellation will stay in place until “the signal stabilizes.”

Also Tuesday, Israeli media reported that Wizz Air, British Airways, Iberia and Azerbaijan Airlines were among several airlines to cancel flights to Israel’s major airport, Ben-Gurion airport in Tel Aviv.