"The Pirates Front Office Comes to Penn State"
February 2008 featured two visits to Penn State by senior executives from the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Despite the snowy Saturday morning, a roomful of
law, business, journalism, statistics and other
students and faculty showed up on February 9 in
the Beam Building to hear Penn State alumnus Frank
Coonelly, the Bucs' new chief executive officer
speak on his legal career. Coonelly reflected on
his legal experience, primarily as a labor lawyer
for Morgan, Lewis and Bockius, where Major League
Baseball (MLB) was a key client, and then as in-house
labor counsel for MLB. Coonelly's experience of
developing skills in legal practices outside of
sports before entering the sports industry is typical
of prominent sports lawyers.
Coonelly discussed Pirates' plans to improve player
development through new minor league and scouting
staff and through their new academy in the Dominican
Republic. He also discussed his role as labor counsel
in working with teams on payroll issues, focusing
on players eligible for salary arbitration and fielded
questions from the audience.
Several weeks later on February 25, a unique exercise
in baseball salary arbitration was concluded with
a special visit by Larry Silverman, Pirates' vice
president and general counsel. Last fall, Silverman
(and Dodgers' executives Ned Colletti and Kim Ng)
provided us with arbitration-eligible players from
their teams. Law students were paired with business
students and assigned to represent a specific player
or club, to research and develop a credible arbitration
offer, and to write a brief in support of their
argument. The two best briefs happened to concern
the same player, All-Star second baseman Freddy
Sanchez. The law students presented a brief stylized
argument to Mr. Silverman. For additional coverage,
see http://www.collegian.psu.edu/archive/2008/02/26/students_learn_to_negotiate_sa.aspx.
