LOS ANGELES—The $4.7 billion jury verdict against the NFL in the Sunday Ticket case has been overturned by the federal judge who presided over the class action lawsuit against the NFL in a ruling that said the jury did not follow his instructions in determining damages.
The Associated Press reported that U.S. District Judge Philip Gutierrez ruled that: “Without the testimonies of Dr. (Daniel) Rascher and Dr. (John) Zona, no reasonable jury could have found class-wide injury or damages.”
In a statement the NFL said: “We are grateful for today’s ruling in the Sunday Ticket class action lawsuit. We believe that the N.F.L.’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.”
The plaintiffs in the case can appeal the ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit.
The lawsuit covered 2.4 million residential subscribers and 48,000 businesses in the U.S. who paid for the package of out-of-market games from the 2011 through 2022 seasons on DirecTV.
The plaintiffs in the case argued that the NFL had abused its market power to artificially restrict competition and raise the cost of the package, which ran about $300.
In late June, the jury ruled in favor of the plaintiffs. The damages had included about $4.7 billion for residential subscribers and nearly $100 million for bars, restaurants and other businesses that subscribed to the package. In Federal antitrust cases damages can be tripled, which would have brought the total to over $14.3 billion.
The verdict came after a three-week trial and years of legal wrangling over the package of out-of-market games that was held by DirecTV until it was taken over by YouTube during the last season.
