A Los Angeles federal judge overturned a shocking $4.7 billion antitrust verdict against the NFL Thursday, ruling that a misguided jury followed improper methodologies in determining the huge damages award.
U.S. District Judge Philip Gutierrez, who oversaw the case, said the jury was led astray by plaintiffs lawyers and expert witnesses in rendering an award that could have been tripled under federal antitrust guidelines.
Also read: Why the NFL Probably Won't Pay More Than a Dollar of That $4.7 Billion ‘Sunday Ticket’ Verdict
“Without the testimonies of Dr. [Daniel] Rascher and Dr. [John] Zona, no reasonable jury could have found class-wide injury or damages,” Gutierrez wrote at the end of his 16-page ruling.
Associated Press was at the Los Angeles courthouse Thursday and reported on this ruling.
In June, a jury in the Los Angeles class-action trial agreed with the plaintiffs' argument that the NFL conspired with DirecTV to keep the price of its out-of-market games TV package, NFL Sunday Ticket, artificially high.
The lawsuit covered 2.4 million consumers and 48,000 business over the span of the 2011 - 2022 seasons.
As AP noted, the case, originally introduced in 2015, was dismissed in 2017 but already brought back to life once by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.
Speaking on CNBC earlier this month, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell didn't seem particularly worried about how it would all turn out.
