Kingsford Charcoal Shades NCAA with #PayEd Campaign Featuring Ed O'Bannon

After winning a landmark court battle with the NCAA over student-athletes' rights of publicity, former UCLA Bruins forward Ed O'Bannon is now the face of a national advertising campaign for Kingsford Charcoal.

The premise of the campaign is simple: The NCAA refused to pay O'Bannon and thousands of other former student-athletes for the use of their likenesses after their graduation or departure from college athletics.

With this in mind, Kingsford has placed O'Bannon on the front of charcoal bags hitting shelves this March.

ESPN's Darren Rovell tweeted out an image of the new bags. The tagline of the campaign takes a shot at the NCAA, stating, "Lights 25% faster, doesn't burn athletes."

According to Rovell, Kingsford will pay O'Bannon $1 every time the hashtag #PayEd is used.

Kingsford released a statement regarding the campaign, and it appears quite happy to be paying an athlete to use his likeness.

Kingsford announced, per Yahoo Sports college basketball writer Jeff Eisenberg:

"

Kingsford Charcoal has become one of the many companies to use the likeness of a famous amateur basketball player for marketing purposes during that mad, mad month of March. Kingsford is just adding a surprising twist: the charcoal brand is actually going to pay that player—Ed O'Bannon—for placing him on the front of a limited bag of charcoal.

"

It's a novel marketing strategy by Kingsford, which appears to be the first large corporation to market itself with a national campaign against the NCAA's retention of former players' rights to publicity.

As for the association itself, the campaign adds oil (charcoal?) to a fire threatening to burn deep into the NCAA's coffers. Former corporate partner Electronic Arts, purveyor of the NCAA March Madness and NCAA Football video game franchises, reached a $40 million settlement with O'Bannon and three other plaintiffs in 2013 that abruptly made over 100,000 former student-athletes eligible for compensation.

ERIC DRAPER/Associated Press

In any case, O'Bannon is still out there fighting for players' rights, and with the help of a grilling amenity company, he is shoving a red-hot briquet in the NCAA's eye.

Have a fun March, everyone.

Dan is on Twitter. He hopes one day college athletes will have exclusive rights to their souls.