As the NFL challenges last month’s jury verdict in the Sunday Ticket antitrust class action, it is also taking steps to ensure NFL owners don’t need to radically change broadcasting arrangements or post what might be a multibillion-dollar bond to be able to appeal.
On Tuesday, attorneys for NFL teams filed objections to a proposed judgment offered by plaintiffs’ attorneys on July 2. The plaintiffs, who consist of more than 2.4 million residential subscribers and more than 48,000 restaurants, bars and other commercial establishments that purchased Sunday Ticket from 2011 to 2023, urge U.S. District Judge Philip Gutierrez to declare that the NFL owes the residential subscribers $13.8 billion and the commercial establishments $291 million. These figures represent the tripling of the jury’s awards to residential subscribers and commercial establishments ($4.6 billion and $97 million, respectively).
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Antitrust law calls for private plaintiffs who successfully bring antitrust cases to recover treble damages. The underlying logic: forcefully deter anticompetitive conduct and punish wrongdoers beyond making them pay for the harm they inflicted. Critics of trebling contend it leads to gratuitous and unearned windfalls for plaintiffs and their attorneys and is excessively punitive in a legal system that is supposed to prioritize fairness.
As Sportico explained Monday, the NFL has raised multiple arguments to Gutierrez in hopes of convincing him to issue a judgment for the league in spite of the jury’s ruling or at least lower the damages awarded.
The NFL contends the jury misunderstood key economic terms, including by confusing “overcharge” with “discount,” and invented a mathematical formula to calculate damages that the plaintiffs’ attorneys didn’t even propose. The NFL’s latest filing revisits those arguments and asks Gutierrez to not issue an order until there are further deliberations.
The NFL also argues that before…
Source link : https://www.yahoo.com/news/nfl-urges-court-halt-advancing-201010068.html
Author : Sportico
Publish date : 2024-07-11 20:10:10
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