Stay up to date with the Sunday Ticket process

When I was a kid, I read the sports page every morning, eating a bowl of Frosted Flakes before they got too soggy. Every now and then, I’d check out the rest of the paper.

And then I stopped.

There was always something that had been going on for a while. The last story on this assumed a basic level of understanding of the situation. If you didn’t have that, you were SOL.

For those of you who have returned to football after a summer of doing other things, you have seen articles about the Sunday Ticket lawsuit. You may not understand what it is all about. So here is a summary of what the case is about, what happened, what is next and how you can find out more about it.

The case dates back to 2015. It is a combination of a class action lawsuit brought by retail establishments and a class action lawsuit on behalf of more than 2.4 million individual Sunday Ticket customers. The combined lawsuits cover the years 2011-2022.

Anyone who bought a Sunday ticket during this period should check out this websiteand optionally add it to your bookmarks.

The claims are fairly straightforward. Since 1961, the NFL has had the ability to sell television rights as a league to free terrestrial networks, thanks to an antitrust exemption granted to it by Congress. That exemption, as former commissioner Pete Rozelle testified before Congress at the time, was never intended to apply to “pay” television.

When the NFL first sold TV rights to cable networks in the late 1980s (half a season of Sunday nights on ESPN), no one pressed the antitrust issue. When the NFL sold an out-of-market package to DirecTV in 1994, the potential antitrust violation was hidden in plain sight.

The harm, as alleged and proven in that case, stemmed from the NFL setting a price for Sunday Ticket that induced millions who would have bought the program to buy games available on local CBS and Fox affiliates. That allowed the NFL to find a middle ground between getting billions from DirecTV (thanks to fans who willingly paid the inflated price) and billions from CBS and Fox (who reluctantly tolerated the loss of Sunday Ticket ratings).

After nine years of litigation, including an original district court judge who dismissed the case and an appeals court that resurrected it, the trial began in June. Although the worst-case scenario for the NFL was announced before the trial began as 21 billion dollarscoverage was sparse and bland. Niche outlets ran sporadic stories. The AP occasionally promoted a story that painted a broad but incomplete picture. There was no one constantly in the courtroom, watching the trial and sending daily updates on how things were going.

We were trying to sound the alarm that something big might be coming. Few were listening. Those who were listening were willing to ignore the concerns, probably because so few were saying, “Hey, the NFL could lose a lot of money here.”

Then came the verdict: $4.7 billion. If/when it becomes an official verdict, it will automatically triple to $14.1 billion.

The NFL will continue to fight; there is too much money at stake. Based on what the judge said during the trial, the NFL may have a chance to overturn the verdict. And if the verdict becomes official, the NFL will appeal the result as far as possible.

Given that the trial was so sloppily covered, we purchased the full, 2,506-page transcript earlier this month. I’ve been reviewing it, day after day.

If you’re interested in the relationships someone/anyone should generate during the case, here are links to the first eight days of the trial:

Day 1 (jury selection).

Day 2 (Opening Statements).

Day 2-3 (testimony of Steve Bornstein, former NFL Media CEO).

Day 3 (Testimony of Plaintiff Robert Lipincott, Expelled Saints Fan).

Day 4 (Fox CEO Larry Jones’ testimony).

Day 5-6 (Dr. Daniel Rascher’s Damage Testimony).

Day 6 (Judge vents frustration on plaintiffs’ lawyers).

Day 6 (testimony of Brian Rolapp, current head of NFL Media).

Day 7 (expert testimony on compensation claims).

Day 8 (Roger Goodell’s testimony).

I still have almost 1000 pages left in the transcript. So there’s more to do.

And there will be more in court. On Wednesday, a judge will hear arguments on the NFL’s motion to order as a matter of law.

Eventually, the appeals will take place. Given that there is $14.1 billion at stake, the case will go all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. It will be many more years before that happens.

Along the way, the question is whether the NFL will change its Sunday Ticket pricing structure to avoid further liability. Or simply get rid of Sunday Ticket altogether.

And whether and to what extent the owners will try to pass on some of the $14.1 billion to others. Starting with the players.

We will continue to cover this case and summarize the transcript on our dedicated page with all the Sunday Ticket stories. For those who bought a Sunday Ticket from 2011 to 2022, a hefty check could finally be coming. For those who want to keep buying one, there’s a chance it’ll become a lot easier and cheaper to get.

Win or lose, this is the inescapable truth. The NFL exploited its most ardent fans by paying far more than they should have to pay to watch games outside their market. The “choice” came at a high enough cost that most of the displaced fans watched games they could get in their local markets, allowing the NFL to double-dip into the billion-dollar buckets presented to them by DirectTV and CBS/Fox.