Columbus Crew to Austin Texas?

Yeah.. if you look at the time stamps of when the article was posted and when MLS filed the dismissal, it does seem that they waited until the Statesmen posted to file the paperwork with the court..

 

I think the point of MLS arguing that they are the owner of the team rather than PSV or Precourt is they read the law as requiring financial assistance to the owner rather than the team.

I doubt that interpretation flies in court, but they seem dedicated to it. Precourt's
Twitter account no longer identifies him as owner of the Crew as of this morning.

 

We do try and limit overly harsh language in the N&A forums though. Sometimes less successfully than others. We've been a little more lenient with this thread given the associated emotions, but even then there are limits.

 

I fully expect screenshots of press releases, Twitter, etc to be used against them

 

Certainly. The claim that MLS rather than the investor/operators own the teams might be convenient for litigation purposes but isn't how the league and owners have been representing themselves for years.

 

That is hilarious! They are so ridiculous.
This type of behavior (saying the owners aren't the owners to try to win a court case) is not going to attract fans and is going to make long term fans like me stop supporting the league. Just dumb on so many levels.

 

Really? I know you wrote it, but I sincerely can't imagine someone going, oh, Precourt changed his Twitter account, I'm not going to follow MLS.

Not arguing it's not dumb and silly. Of course it is. But how could that affect someone's fandom?

 

The act of saying the owners don't own the teams just to try to win a court case is not the kind of league I want to support. If you do that is cool. So yes, I meant every word of what I said. It is not just a twitter status being changed. You are intentionally simplifying it.

So no, I am not saying, "Precourt changed his Twitter account, I'm not going to follow MLS." It is way more than that and you know it. The twitter thing is just a public act that solidifies their behavior.
I am saying this league will stop at nothing to screw fans. A league that says it is committed to community. The fact that they think having an owner change his title on twitter helps them in a court case is just sad. The fact that they are coming out full force with this "owners don't own the team" stuff is why i will choose to not support the league.

 

I watch games.

 

Good for you.
After "watching games" since 96, I watch very little now. It is going to be even less now.

 

I think a Statesman reader will conclude negative things about Precourt. Austin deserves better.

It's just another in a long line of jerk moves. 1st being, moving The Columbus Crew.

 

I've now read the motion to dismiss. It's pretty weak, making a lot of the argument that they've separated the stadium and team therefore the state and court should ignore that both have the same owner.

The Modell law imposes a burden on businesses which operate sports teams in Ohio but the bit about favoring local residents over out of state residents seems to me their best argument. There are good responses available to the city and state though.

LLCs are pass through entities so I doubt the ownership structure of the parties will matter much to the court. But it might matter to the union and other interested parties.

 

Ya think?

 

I also kind of like the ownership being across state lines argument. Given MLS's single entity structure, being the I/O (owner) of a team means more than owning a team. It also means they are part owner of MLS and SUM. I'm not sure that is something that can be seized by Ohio?

 

MLS does business in Ohio and some of the sued entities have addresses in Ohio. So the argument they don't have a presence in Ohio is weak. The memorandum claims Ohio law and the Columbus charter prohibit the taking of intangible property.

Since the city has taken intangible property in other cases, I'm curious about that. The motion claims the Columbus charter only authorizes taking fee simple property which if it were enforced is very restrictive. Facing a taking? Just cloud your title!

 

Oh no. I'm not saying they don't have a presence in Ohio. Just saying that since MLS is single entity, that I like the argument that the ownership portion of the Crew is in Delaware. So kind of a "Congrats, you can have all the stuff in Ohio, but you don't get to operate a team."

 

So you'r willing to endorse the legal fantasy that MLS and/or the Crew is in Delaware but not the physical reality that the team has been located in Ohio for 22 years?

 

Not to mention, PSV isn't only the team's investor/operator, it's also a partial league owner.

 

But the team (including all its intangible property) is in Ohio so it's subject to Ohio law, including a potential taking. Other states, Delaware or New York in this case, have to recognize and give full faith and credit to judicial proceedings in Ohio.

I suspect MLS is advancing that argument so that when their motion to dismiss loses, they'll fall back on a diversity in residency argument that the case should be moved to US district court (though the applicable law will still be the Modell statute).

Put another way, if all of MLS is in Delaware, then their interstate commerce argument falls apart, doesn't it?

 

Yes, one of the good things that will surely come out of this is much greater clarity on the structure of MLS and its associated entities. It seems that MLS is an LLC with the team operators as members. Are there other members, maybe USSF?

 

I'm actually a bit surprised that MLS didn't submit (under seal) copies of the articles of formation/franchise agreements as exhibits. As of now, the court doesn't have any context for their legal argument. USSF submitted similar documents in the anti-trust suit (including NASL's articles of formation). Obviously different arguments of course, but...

 

Fortunately, as you know, all of that is listed in the AG's discovery request. And a whole lot more. The stuff listed would lay MLS as bare as Stormy Danials working a club in Scranton.

But much more interesting.

Seriously though, they didn't even refer to Fraser v MLS. Yes, again, different context but still.

 

Well, we do know of other Class B Stockholders. Alan Rothenberg for one had a huge chunk. Ken Horowitz at one ti.e theoretically owned 1/12th of the league and it.was announced that he could keep it

I believe USSF also received an ownership share in return for their $25 million initial investment. It wasn't a gift.

 

I thought Horowitz still had some of SUM but was out of MLS because he couldn't make the cash calls 15 years ago?

The MLS argument about impairment of contract looks weak if the ownership of Crew Soccer LLC is transferred from PSV to local investors. It will still be Crew Soccer as a member of MLS, just different people representing it at league meetings.