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Sometimes instant replay can change the outcome of an NFL game.
Sometimes the judicial equivalent can wipe out a potential $14.1 billion victory for plaintiffs.
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The latter happened late Thursday when U.S. District Judge Philip S. Gutierrez granted the NFL a judgment as a matter of law in the In Re: NFL’s “Sunday Ticket” Antitrust Litigation. Such judgments are difficult to obtain, because it means the judge concludes—as Gutierrez bluntly wrote in his 16-page order—”no reasonable jury could have found class-wide injury or damages.”
The ruling is a total victory for the NFL, which lost a jury trial last month in Los Angeles. The jury found in favor of a class action representing more than 2.4 million residential subscribers and more than 48,000 restaurants, bars and other commercial establishments that purchased Sunday Ticket anytime between 2011 to 2023. Jurors concluded the NFL violated antitrust law through its 32 teams pooling broadcasting rights for out-of-town fans and, supposedly, exploiting that pooling to charge higher prices. The jury awarded $4.6 billion and $97 million to the residential subscribers and commercial establishments, respectively.
In a hearing Wednesday, the NFL maintained the jury misunderstood how antitrust law works and fumbled a calculation for damages by confusing an overcharge with a discount.
In his ruling, Gutierrez determined that the jury was misled by expert testimony offered by the plaintiffs. The testimony used “flawed methodologies” that led the jury to mistakenly find “class-wide injury and damages.”
The judge added there is “no other support” for those findings except for expert testimony that should have been excluded.
More specifically, Gutierrez said one expert hypothesized what would happen if NFL teams adopted a college football model, which does not utilize pooling for out-of-market games. The expert surmised the games would “become available, just like on Saturday, on…
Source link : https://www.yahoo.com/news/nfl-scores-sunday-ticket-win-003531119.html
Author : Sportico
Publish date : 2024-08-02 00:35:31
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