Partner Irwin Raij was quoted in USA Today’s article, “NFL Sponsors Still Sticking with the ‘Shield,’” on September 15, 2014, discussing major sponsors continuing their affiliation with the National Football League around news of the Ray Rice scandal. Raij said, “I think the sponsors are monitoring this, but I don’t think we’ve seen any negative effect on the league’s business to date. The shield, as the NFL likes to say, seems to be as strong as ever from a business standpoint.”
He continued to discuss the risks for companies and mentioned that sponsors are likely to drop deals on an individual player level. In reference to Nike dropping Ray Rice after video of Rice punching his wife surfaced Raij said, “Typically, you like to have moral clauses in deals like that, and you can invoke those. It’s a little bit harder at the league level. For a company to leave Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson (indicted for child abuse), that’s not surprising. But leaving the league would be surprising as of now.”