In 2011, quarterbacks Tom Brady, Drew Brees, and Payton Manning, representing a class including current NFL players, claimed that a league-imposed lockout was a horizontal group boycott among competitors (the NFL teams) and a per se violation of Sherman Act §1. The lockout meant that athletes would not be paid or permitted to use club facilities, and it was imposed by the NFL after the players’ union and the NFL failed to reach agreement. The players argued that the NFL conspired to eliminate competition for professional football players through a series of anticompetitive restrictions, including a salary cap that fixed maximum amounts for player salaries, and the “franchise player” and “transition player” designations, which limited players from receiving a contract from any NFL team other than the player’s immediate prior team. Discuss the ethics, using principles from ethical theory, of the NFL practices that eliminate competition in the market for professional football players.