Lawyerball: The Courtroom Battle of the Orioles Against the Nationals and MLB for the Future of Baseball

An owners’ fight over an inside baseball arbitration splitting cable television profits spills into a New York City trial court. Lawyerball traces this dispute from the baseball antitrust exemption to the implications of the judge’s rulings for the baseball business, the game, its fans, and ordinary Americans. Lawyerball tells the story of the monopolization of baseball as an American business, and its disappearance from much of American life. It has lessons about the shrinking rights of Americans to go to court with their grievances. It also has lessons about the vanishing freedom of Americans to choose their work. This story about the future of baseball might foretell the future of America. In 2005, thirty Major League Baseball clubs owned the near-bankrupt Montreal Expos. The clubs signed a television contract with the Baltimore Orioles. The Orioles owner agreed to not sue MLB over the relocation of the Expos to Washington, D.C. In return, MLB gave the Orioles the rights to cablecast the Washington Nationals future games. MLB then sold the Expos to a Washington real estate billionaire. He had to work with the Orioles owner, a class-action lawyer, to make a contract work that he had not negotiated. The first time these owners were required to cooperate, accusations flew between them. Three years later, the Orioles, the Nationals and MLB sat before a New York trial judge. He would decide how to shift more than $100 million dollars between the teams. He would chart the future of baseball.