U.S. District Court Judge Kevin Castel issued a temporary restraining order against Reebok to prevent it from continuing to sell apparel featuring Tim Tebow and his new team, The New York Jets. As reported, Nike, which officially takes over the NFL license from Reebok on Sunday, sued Reebok over the sales.
The court also ordered Reebok, which had owned by NFL license for the last ten years, to contact and warn stores that continuing to sell the items will expose them to legal liability. Reebok also must offer to repurchase the items from retailers. Nike lost its effort to have the judge order the destruction of any Tebow items in Reebok's possession.
Tebow was traded from the Denver Broncos to the Jets on March 21, creating a media frenzy and a huge spike in demand for Tebow-related Jets apparel in the New York market, according to SportsScanINFO.
To sell a piece of licensed apparel with both a team's name and a players' name, a company needs a rights agreement with both the National Football League and either the licensing arm of the NFL Players Association or the player himself.
Nike's suit says that it already has such a deal with Tebow, as well as with the union.
Reebok, owned by Adidas AG, has declined comment on the case.
