The NFL scored a victory worth up to $14.1 billion in court on Thursday when a federal district court judge threw out a jury’s verdict in an antitrust lawsuit that targeted the league’s “Sunday Ticket” online viewing package.
In a 16-page order, U.S. District Judge Philip Gutierrez in New York took issue with how the jury arrived at its figures of $4.6 billion to residential customers and $97 million to commercial establishments, saying they were “not based on the ‘evidence and reasonable inferences’ but instead were more akin to ‘guesswork or speculation.'”
In antitrust cases, the amounts of the verdict would be tripled.
Gutierrez also faulted testimony from expert witnesses Daniel Rascher and John Zona, who were testifying for the plaintiffs in the class-action case that represents some 2.4 million residential subscribers and 48,000 commercial establishments.
“The Court agrees that Dr. Rascher’s and Dr. Zona’s testimonies based on their flawed methodologies should be excluded. And because there was no other support for the class-wide injury and damages elements of Plaintiffs’ … claims, judgment as a matter of law for the Defendants is appropriate,” the filing said.
“No reasonable jury could have found class-wide injury or damages,” Gutierrez wrote.
The plaintiffs have the option of appealing the decision to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
The NFL responded to the judge’s move with a statement: “We are grateful for today’s ruling in the Sunday Ticket class action lawsuit. We believe that the NFL’s media distribution model provides our fans with an array of options to follow the game they love, including local broadcasts of every single game on free over-the-air television. We thank Judge Gutierrez for his time and attention to this case and look forward to an exciting 2024 NFL season.”
In a hearing on Wednesday, the NFL argued that the jurors did not understand antitrust law, which led to confusion in reaching their compensation amount.
The “Sunday Ticket” package enables viewers to see NFL games that involve teams out of their home markets.
The plaintiffs’ attorneys maintained that the one price to see all out-of-market broadcasts is unfair to customers who may want to watch just one or a few teams.
“Given the relatively low cost of internet streaming and satellite and cable television carriage, each team acting independently would offer their games at a competitive price to anybody in the country who wanted to watch that particular team,” the plaintiffs argued. “Instead, however, the teams have all forgone this option in favor of creating a more lucrative monopoly.”
The judge faulted the expert testimony for not explaining “how these out-of-market telecasts would have been available for free to cable and satellite customers.”
–Field Level Media