After just two days of deliberations, the jury in the NFL “Sunday Ticket” trial found the NFL had violated antitrust laws.
By making “Sunday Ticket” available only on DirecTV and monopolizing the price, the jury found the league must pay about $4.7 billion to fans and an additional $96 million to bars that used the exclusive service to broadcast games.
In a statement, the NFL said it would appeal the ruling, calling it “baseless and without merit.”
“We are disappointed with today’s jury verdict in the NFL Sunday Ticket class action lawsuit,” The league said“We continue to believe that our media distribution strategy, which offers every NFL game on free terrestrial television in participating teams’ markets, national broadcast of the most popular games and complements many other options including RedZone, Sunday Ticket and NFL+, is the most fan-friendly distribution model ever for all of sports and entertainment.”
“We will certainly challenge this verdict as we believe the class action claims in this case are frivolous and without merit. We thank the jurors for their time and effort, as well as the guidance and supervision we received from Judge Gutierrez throughout the trial.”
