Impact of Martin Decision Is Limited

While Casey Martin negotiates his cart around the finer golf courses of America, will other disabled athletes clog courts with lawsuits demanding rule changes?

Not according to legal experts, sports organizations and those who work with disabled athletes. Their voices are nearly unanimous: Dispense with the hysterics.

The U.S. Supreme Court decision forcing the PGA Tour to let the disabled golfer ride a cart during competition should not dramatically alter the playing field, from youth sports to the pros, experts say. Conditions in which a Martin-like rule modification would be ordered by a court are difficult to replicate.

“Can Chicken Little say the sky is falling because Casey Martin can ride a golf cart? Is this some great sea change in the law? No,” said Bob Naeve, an Irvine defense attorney who specializes in Americans With Disabilities Act law.

The majority opinion, written by Justice John Paul Stevens, narrowed the impact by ruling that courts must consider whether a requested “modification” would allow a disabled person to participate without “fundamentally altering the nature of the activity.”

The court ruled that a modification must be reasonable and necessary--significant legal hurdles.

“In a lot of sports and with a lot of disabilities, there is not a reasonable modification,” Naeve said. “It must be determined that without the modification, it is beyond your capacity to engage in the activity. Only if you establish both do you reach the question of whether the modification would alter the fundamental nature of the game. That’s a lot to prove.”

In recent years, legal challenges from disabled high school athletes have been few.

Monroe High, for example, has nearly 450 disabled students, 90% of whom are mainstreaming into the general population. Many have participated in athletics, among them a tennis player who suffered from progeria, an extremely rare disease that accelerates aging; a City Section champion wrestler unable to mentally process body movements, and a blind swimmer.

“A lot of disabled kids participate, but none, to my knowledge, have asked for special accommodations,” said Tom Jones, Monroe’s dean of students, wrestling coach and a former special education teacher.

When it comes to finding a place for disabled athletes, most high school coaches and administrators are far more open than stubborn PGA Tour officials.

“Our stance is to do anything we can to get these people included,” Jones said.

The California Interscholastic Federation, the governing body of state high school sports, also believes it has been proactive in conforming to the ADA law, making provisions for a blind girl to compete in the state track meet, allowing signers to stand on the sidelines and communicate with deaf athletes and allowing disabled golfers to use carts.

Last year, however, the CIF tried to bar wheelchair-bound baseball Coach Victor Barrios of Magnolia High from coaching third base. Barrios sued in federal court and the CIF agreed to a settlement allowing him to coach.

The CIF said it balked at Barrios’ request because of liability concerns: An opposing fielder could trip over his wheelchair or he could be hit with a line drive. But because he sought remedy in the courts, the CIF believed it was no longer exposed to liability and relented.

“In terms of philosophy, the CIF or individual high schools are apt to be accommodating to people with disabilities,” CIF general counsel Andy Patterson said. “But just because you are disabled doesn’t mean you are going to be on the team. Like anybody else, you have to be good enough.”

Judges are left to evaluate whether a modification would fundamentally alter the activity, which might seem obvious to someone who follows sports. However, Justice Antonin Scalia, in the dissenting opinion, wrote that the majority ruling could allow parents of a Little League player with attention deficit disorder to make the case that their child should get four strikes instead of three.

“That’s preposterous,” said John Parry, director of the American Bar Assn.’s commission on mental and physical disability law. “[Scalia] was just being bitterly sarcastic. He didn’t like the logic and it was just a dig. I don’t think anybody would take it seriously.”

For the record, Little League isn’t worried.

“The PGA Tour and Little League Baseball are obviously very different, so we trust that [the] decision will not negatively impact Little League or youth sports in general,” Little League spokesman Lance Van Auken said.

Major league baseball believes it will be similarly unaffected.

“The ruling is narrowly tailored to the facts of the case and it is very difficult to imagine any applicability to baseball,” said Tom Ostertag, baseball’s general counsel.

Even in golfing circles, the fallout over the Martin decision appears overblown.

The American Junior Golf Assn., which governs the highest level of junior golf, has a no-cart rule for players. Many of the top players in the world are alumni of the AJGA: Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, David Duval--even Martin.

Peter Ripa, chief operations officer for the AJGA, said his organization has never received a request from a player to use a cart, not even from Martin. He doesn’t expect anything to change.

The AJGA has a member, 16-year-old Mallory Code of Tampa, Fla., who has every reason to request a cart. When she was 6 weeks old, Code was found to have cystic fibrosis, a life-shortening, hereditary disease that inhibits the digestive and respiratory systems.

At 14, she found out she also had diabetes. She also is being treated for a pancreatic disorder and suffers from severe asthma. Code plays with an insulin pump and occasionally takes breaks to catch her breath or use her inhaler. Still, she has played her way to a No. 23 national ranking and has never requested a cart.

“I’ve never thought about needing one,” she said. “I’ve never played with a cart. Not even when we just go out on our course with family and friends. I always walk.”

Golfers at other levels, however, have requested carts. Alexandra Braga, a 17-year-old from Oakland, received permission from the CIF to ride while recovering from injuries she suffered when a tree fell on her and crushed her pelvis.

Allison Schauppner, a senior at Corona del Mar High, used a cart the last two seasons to help alleviate pain caused by a disorder that causes fragments of bone to detach near the knee joint.

Corona del Mar golf Coach Mike Starkweather, who had to fight to get permission for Schauppner to use a cart, said he doesn’t foresee others trying to follow in the wake of the Martin decision.

“I don’t think it’s going to open up any cans of worms,” Starkweather said. “The first thing you have to be able to do is play at the required skill level. Most of the time when people saw that Allison could do that . . . they were very understanding.”

Martin, 28, suffers from Klippel-Trenaunay-Weber syndrome, a congenital defect that deprives him of circulation in his right leg. His doctors say he eventually will lose the leg.

“A lot of this has to do with perspective,” Parry said. “If you take the view that golf is the most important thing in the world, you don’t agree with the ruling. If you realize that sports is one small aspect of life, and that the ADA is trying to integrate those with disabilities into all aspects of life, you agree.

“Martin’s particular disability in his particular sport led to a particular modification. The court established that similar challenges must be considered on a case-by-case basis. Not too many will fit as neatly as Martin’s.”

Times staff writers Paul McLeod and Peter Yoon contributed to this story.