Long Island

[Cataholic]

If the Cats have a season a Utah will have to pay.

Are you funding the legal bills when MSU loses that loser case? MSU would likely pay for Utah’s legal bills, too.

Are you suggesting that ‘60s Cats legal advice is 100% wrong? It’s almost like he’s never heard of force majeure.

By no means should MSU pursue legal action. We would be hard pressed to get future FBS games.

However, you can’t claim force majeure for just select games. If Utah can play games in California, they could definitely play a home against a Montana team. A legal action would have some merit.

Their conference cancelled out of conf games for everyone. If Utah had made the decision, Cats would have a case, but since the Utes have been ordered by a higher authority no to play the game, any lawsuit against a Utah would be laughed out the door.

That is an interesting argument, but our agreement would be with Utah, not the PAC 12. Additionally, Utah is member of the PAC 12 and has input on conference decisions. If your theory was correct, wouldn’t all companies use subsidiaries for agreements and when they wanted to exit an agreement, the parent company could just claim force majeure as a higher authority. While I understand your reasoning, I think saying “they would be laughed out of court” is a stretch. How they treat other games (non-conference versus conference) would be key to whether force majeure. It seems both sides have reasonable arguments.

[onceacat]

If the Cats have a season a Utah will have to pay.

Are you funding the legal bills when MSU loses that loser case? MSU would likely pay for Utah’s legal bills, too.

Are you suggesting that ‘60s Cats legal advice is 100% wrong? It’s almost like he’s never heard of force majeure.

By no means should MSU pursue legal action. We would be hard pressed to get future FBS games.

However, you can’t claim force majeure for just select games. If Utah can play games in California, they could definitely play a home against a Montana team. A legal action would have some merit.

Their conference cancelled out of conf games for everyone. If Utah had made the decision, Cats would have a case, but since the Utes have been ordered by a higher authority no to play the game, any lawsuit against a Utah would be laughed out the door.

That is an interesting argument, but our agreement would be with Utah, not the PAC 12. Additionally, Utah is member of the PAC 12 and has input on conference decisions. If your theory was correct, wouldn’t all companies use subsidiaries for agreements and when they wanted to exit an agreement, the parent company could just claim force majeure as a higher authority. While I understand your reasoning, I think saying “they would be laughed out of court” is a stretch. How they treat other games (non-conference versus conference) would be key to whether force majeure. It seems both sides have reasonable arguments.

Companies routinely use subsidiaries for precisely those purposes. Which is why it requires legislative action to change allow upward migration of responsibility.

But Utah isn't a subsidiary of the Pac 12, it's a member. So we aren't even talking about something remotely similar. Its more like if the Board of Regents banned football in Montana, would Dixie State get to sue MSU? Of course not. You can probably find some back alley attorney to take on the case, but judges get pretty peeved when people waste their time with frivolous lawsuits like this...Maybe "laughed out" is a little extreme. Perhaps "you are going to have to search really hard to find a judge willing to waste everyones time with a joke lawsuit like this" is more apropos.

[Cataholic]

If the Cats have a season a Utah will have to pay.

Are you funding the legal bills when MSU loses that loser case? MSU would likely pay for Utah’s legal bills, too.

Are you suggesting that ‘60s Cats legal advice is 100% wrong? It’s almost like he’s never heard of force majeure.

By no means should MSU pursue legal action. We would be hard pressed to get future FBS games.

However, you can’t claim force majeure for just select games. If Utah can play games in California, they could definitely play a home against a Montana team. A legal action would have some merit.

Their conference cancelled out of conf games for everyone. If Utah had made the decision, Cats would have a case, but since the Utes have been ordered by a higher authority no to play the game, any lawsuit against a Utah would be laughed out the door.

That is an interesting argument, but our agreement would be with Utah, not the PAC 12. Additionally, Utah is member of the PAC 12 and has input on conference decisions. If your theory was correct, wouldn’t all companies use subsidiaries for agreements and when they wanted to exit an agreement, the parent company could just claim force majeure as a higher authority. While I understand your reasoning, I think saying “they would be laughed out of court” is a stretch. How they treat other games (non-conference versus conference) would be key to whether force majeure. It seems both sides have reasonable arguments.

Companies routinely use subsidiaries for precisely those purposes. Which is why it requires legislative action to change allow upward migration of responsibility.

But Utah isn't a subsidiary of the Pac 12, it's a member. So we aren't even talking about something remotely similar. Its more like if the Board of Regents banned football in Montana, would Dixie State get to sue MSU? Of course not. You can probably find some back alley attorney to take on the case, but judges get pretty peeved when people waste their time with frivolous lawsuits like this...Maybe "laughed out" is a little extreme. Perhaps "you are going to have to search really hard to find a judge willing to waste everyones time with a joke lawsuit like this" is more apropos.

Apparently, there are others who consider such a case to have merit. Specifically in the article below, cancelling some games (non-conference) but playing others (conference games) will affect the validity of a force majeure position.

https://247sports.com/Article/College-f ... 149646635/

From the article:

That leads us to the most compelling question that will stem from this situation: What happens if a program or conference cancels a game due to safety concerns and then plays others anyway?

This is a very plausible scenario. The ACC, for example, is discussing a number of scheduling models. One the main scenarios involves ACC teams playing at least one, but not all, of their out-of-conference games. Another would have Notre Dame, a football independent, playing as part of the league schedule.

In both cases, the league would be choosing to play some non-conference opponents – like keeping Clemson vs. South Carolina to protect a traditional rivalry – but not others. In those all-to-real scenarios, the parties that had games canceled would have strong legal grounds to chase their contractually-mandated payment.

“We’re going to honor all those contracts but none other? That really puts a finer point on it,” Carfagna said. “Why are you picking one school over another? We know why but is that fair?”

Contracts are good-faith agreements, and that term is going to come up often in these conversations. One administrator 247Sports spoke to mentioned that if a league added an additional conference game not usually on the schedule, it shows they were willing to play football in 2020 – just not with their prior scheduled opponent. “That would not be in the spirit of the initial agreement,” the administrator said.

[catscat]

I imagine any case would depend upon what the "contract" says. At the risk of inciting NDSU posters, we did "buy out" the game with NDSU a few years back because the contract allowed us to do so. I don't know, but I suspect contracts didn't anticipate this situation and would have to rely on "an act of God" clause - which I think would be tough to defend if you then went on to play other (conference) games. Whether MSU should sue or not, I don't know, but I would bet that somewhere some FCS school that had it's FBS "money" game canceled will give it a try (assuming the reason for canceling was "act of God and the FBS school plays other games).

[RationalGriz]

Once again, I believe that all P5 contracts contain language that voids the agreement if changes due to conference scheduling procedure. In this case, the conference changed the scheduling procedure to push the season start date back due to Covid. In doing so, they had to drop OOC games to meet the timeline for Conference Championships and Bowl/Playoffs. I really don't see much, if any, path for a lawsuit.

[Hawks86]

The BYU and Montana State contracts have nearly identical wording in Sections 7 and 8 for “uncontrollable forces” and “liquidated damages.”

An “uncontrollable force,” as outlined in the contracts, is labeled as “unusual circumstances beyond their reasonable control, including acts of God, acts of nature, or acts of any governing regulatory body, including but not limited to the NCAA or any governing athletic conference.”

In layman’s terms, an “uncontrollable force” can legally cancel a game. A pandemic would fall under “uncontrollable force.” In regard to specifically the Montana State game and the $675,000 owed, once it is established that an “uncontrollable force” canceled the game, Utah would not be made to pay Montana State, and the “liquidated damages” portion of the contract is moot.

“The BYU and Montana State contracts appear to be drafted by the University of Utah and contain language that “acts of any governing regulatory body, including but not limited to the NCAA or any governing athletic conference” qualify as a “uncontrollable forces” under the contract, and therefore, excuse performance,” David Hall, an attorney with Salt Lake City-based Parsons, Behle & Latimer, told The Tribune in an email. “Since the Pac-12 Conference canceled the non-conference games, it appears the “Uncontrollable Forces” requirement has been met.”

https://www.sltrib.com/sports/utah-utes ... other-pac/

[HelenaCat95]

So can we start a "Utah was scared to play us" thread?

[MSU01]

The BYU and Montana State contracts have nearly identical wording in Sections 7 and 8 for “uncontrollable forces” and “liquidated damages.”

An “uncontrollable force,” as outlined in the contracts, is labeled as “unusual circumstances beyond their reasonable control, including acts of God, acts of nature, or acts of any governing regulatory body, including but not limited to the NCAA or any governing athletic conference.”

In layman’s terms, an “uncontrollable force” can legally cancel a game. A pandemic would fall under “uncontrollable force.” In regard to specifically the Montana State game and the $675,000 owed, once it is established that an “uncontrollable force” canceled the game, Utah would not be made to pay Montana State, and the “liquidated damages” portion of the contract is moot.

“The BYU and Montana State contracts appear to be drafted by the University of Utah and contain language that “acts of any governing regulatory body, including but not limited to the NCAA or any governing athletic conference” qualify as a “uncontrollable forces” under the contract, and therefore, excuse performance,” David Hall, an attorney with Salt Lake City-based Parsons, Behle & Latimer, told The Tribune in an email. “Since the Pac-12 Conference canceled the non-conference games, it appears the “Uncontrollable Forces” requirement has been met.”

https://www.sltrib.com/sports/utah-utes ... other-pac/

Nice to see that someone actually took a few minutes to do a little research to find factual information about the contract. Thanks!