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9er8er
The contract absolutely does compel him to play, at least from an ethics perspective. It also does from a legal perspective. He promised to render services as long as the Rams have upheld their end of their agreement, which they have. He is/was in both legal and moral violation of the pact.
Your argument boils down to a claim that contracts are meaningless, but that is very much opposite of the truth in any functional free society. His "right to liberty and personal autonomy" was what he exercised when he FREELY entered into the agreement. Just as Stan Kroenke has no moral or legal right founded in his right to personal liberty to suddenly withhold paychecks to Donald if he's abiding by his agreement, nor does Donald have such such moral or legal rights to withhold services.
Contracts that are freely entered into and hold each party to their word are linchpins of liberty, not threats to it that a party is avoiding by breaking their promise.
Or the 49ers Chris Borland?
Me thinks not b/c they have a right to retire. Or join the armed forces. Or refuse their services for whatever reasons they deem necessary. There is no difference between the three.
In fact, the CBA and the NFL Players Contract acknowledge this b/c all three of those choices mentioned above are always treated in the same paragraph.
AD's contract is an employment contract for personal services. No court in the land will force someone to work for an employer. The most they will do is grant an injunction to prevent you from working for a competitor.
Court have held that "it would be an invasion of one’s natural liberty to compel him to work for or to remain in the personal service of another...." and elsewhere, "The rule, we think, is without exception that equity will not compel the actual, affirmative performance by an employee of merely personal services . . . .”
Many courts have likened that type of constraint to a condition of involuntary servitude - i.e. slavery - which runs afoul of the Thirteenth Amendment. So no, his contract does Not compel him to play.
On your Stan Kroenke analogy, it's not equivalent.
Kroenke withholding paychecks =
AD getting a signing bonus and then not showing up.
In both cases, the other party has performed and the breaching party is withholding what they said they will give in exchange.
But Donald quitting or retiring without pay is always the right of an employee. And there's nothing morally or legally wrong with an employee exercising that right.
My argument doesn't amount to making contracts meaningless since the contract terms are already in place and dictate what happens if he chooses to exercise his personal, Constitutional, and plain simple human decency liberty right of deciding he doesn't want to be employed anymore.
In such a case, Donald's "damages" he owes if you will are: 1) give back any money advanced, 2) no paychecks, and 3) IF he decides to play football again, he has to play for the Rams.
As with any employment contract, his promise was not that he's going to work for an organization under any and all circumstances; it was essentially that IF he's going to work in football it would be with the Rams for 5 years.
If there is still disagreement - which is fine - we should let it lie here. Let's agree to disagree.
There's a game coming up soon and AD is back anyway...
Enjoy the game!
