A federal judge from the Northern District of Illinois granted the Chicago Cubs’ motion to dismiss the claim of several property owners near Wrigley Field, who had claimed the Cubs breached the contract between the two parties when it expanded Wrigley Field, which obstructed the plaintiffs’ view. The Cubs also defeated the plaintiffs’ claim that it violated antitrust laws.
The Cubs began playing its home games at Wrigley Field in 1916. Since the stadium’s construction in 1914, there have existed a number of apartment buildings across the street on both Sheffield Avenue and Waveland Avenue. The rooftops of these buildings provide spectators a view of the events taking place in Wrigley Field.
In the mid-1980s, the owners of the buildings across the street from Wrigley Field “gradually transformed their original flat-topped roofs into bleacher-style grandstands, and began to form rooftop business entities to serve a growing market for viewing Cubs games and other Wrigley Field events from the rooftops,” which later became the Rooftop businesses, according to the January 2015 complaint.
Business relations between the Cubs and the Rooftops went awry after the 2002 baseball season (2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 19921). The Cubs alleged that the Rooftops were “misappropriating the Cubs’ property by charging admission fees to watch Cubs games from the Rooftops.” To resolve this complaint, the Cubs and the Rooftops entered into a contract which grants the Rooftops a license to sell tickets to view Wrigley Field events from the Rooftops in exchange for 17 percent of the Rooftops’ gross revenues. The Agreement importantly prevents the Cubs from stadium “expansions” that would obstruct the views from the Rooftops. However, there is an important clause: “Any expansion of Wrigley Field approved by governmental authorities shall not be a violation of this Agreement.”
In 2011 the Cubs began lobbying the City of Chicago to approve stadium expansions, which included the approval for signage that would obstruct the view of the Rooftops. With approval from the City Landmarks Commission, in 2014 the Cubs announced plans to install a 2,200 square foot “jumbotron” and two advertising billboards in right field that would “substantially” obstruct the Rooftops’ view. The Rooftops sued.
Their nine-count complaint can be grouped as claims seeking relief for: (1) attempted monopolization (Counts I and II); (2) false and misleading commercial representations, defamation, false light, and breach of the non-disparagement clause (Counts III-VII); and (3) breach of contract (Count VIII and IX).
The Cubs moved to dismiss all counts, pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), or failure to state a claim.
Addressing the monopolization claim first, the court noted that the Supreme Court “in a series of decisions exempted Major League Baseball from the reach of antitrust laws. … As such, the Court finds that the Cubs’ conduct falls into the Major League Baseball exemption from antitrust laws and therefore Counts I and II must be dismissed. Even if the baseball exemption did not apply, the Court would still dismiss Counts I and II because there is no plausible relevant market. The Rooftops must show the existence of a plausible relevant market to prove attempted monopolization. See Nat’l Hockey League Players’ Ass’n v. Plymouth Whalers Hockey Club, 325 F.3d 712, 719-20 (6th Cir. 2003); Tanaka v. Univ. of S. Cal., 252 F.3d 1059, 1063 (9th Cir. 2001).”
The court also dismissed Counts I and II “for the additional reason that antitrust laws cannot limit how the Cubs distribute their own product, specifically live baseball games. A defendant cannot monopolize its own product unless there is proof that the product has no economic substitutes. See, e.g., Elliott v. United Center, No. 95 C 5440, 1996 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 9846, 1996 WL 400030, at *3 (N.D. Ill. July 15, 1996)”
Next, the court looked at Counts III-VII and IX. It granted the motion pertaining to these counts “with prejudice because Ricketts expressed an opinion and made no allegation of criminal activity on the part of the Rooftops, and did not make a statement that was false.”
As for Count VIII, the court concluded that the video board constitutes an “expansion” under Subsection 6.6, and “because the Cubs received governmental approval for its installation they did not plausibly breach the License Agreement. As a result, the court granted the Cubs’ motion to dismiss Count VIII with prejudice.”
Right Field Rooftops, LLC et al v. Chicago Cubs Baseball Club, LLC et al; N.D. Ill.; No. 15 C 551, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 133190; 2015-2 Trade Cas. (CCH) P79, 324; 9/30/15
Attorneys of Record: (For plaintiffs) Abraham Brustein, DiMonte & Lizak, Park Ridge, IL; Thomas M Lombardo, DiMonte & Lizak, LLC, Park Ridge, IL. (for defendants) Andrew A. Kassof, LEAD ATTORNEY, Kirkland & Ellis LLP, Chicago, IL; Daniel E. Laytin, Diana M. Watra, Kirkland & Ellis LLP, Chicago, IL.
