Contrary to published reports, Little Leaguers will not be required to pay an additional $6 fee to wear uniforms with big-league nicknames, Rich Levin, Major League Baseball's chief spokesman, said yesterday.
Levin said there has been no recent increase in the approximately 9 percent licensing fee that manufacturers pay to Major League Baseball Properties (MLBP). A story published Thursday by Florida Today said the $6-per-uniform increase was part of the MLBP's "cracking down" on copyright infringement by "Little League teams and amateur adult leagues."
But Levin said that MLBP only is trying to protect the trademarks of the 28 teams from counterfeiters by encouraging Little League teams to buy their major-league style uniforms from licensed manufacturers.
"We're strict in enforcement as much as possible," Levin said. "We don't go out to Little League fields with undercover agents or anything like that."
Since a lawsuit two years involving an unlicensed Southern California manufacturer, MLBP has been more protective of the 28 trademarks. In the lawsuit, a company making replicas of major-league jerseys claimed it did not have to pay a
licensing fee because the jerseys were intended for Little Leaguers, according to MLBP's former president, Richard White.
The case was settled out of court, and the manufacturer obtained a license agreement with MLBP. But the result was to try to make sure that Little League teams did not violate licensing rules so other companies would not try a similar strategy, White said.
"If they don't exert some control, they run the risk of losing their trademark," said White, who is the president of Strategic Merchandising Associates, a New York-based licensing and consulting firm. "They're going to find themselves years from now in court with a guy who's a downright counterfeiter and he would say, 'Well, you let the Pasadena Little League use the trademark.' "
That does not mean that Little League teams necessarily have to pay more money for their uniforms, White said. When White was president about a year ago, he said any team that could not afford to buy uniforms from a licensed manufacturer could write a letter to MLBP and receive a royalty-free license.
"People who are misunderstanding this have said this is 'Big Brother' trying to get people to buy overpriced licensed products," White said. "And that just isn't the case."