The Plaintiffs in the UFC Antitrust Lawsuit have filed an Opposition to Zuffa’s Motion for Reconsideration of the inclusion of testimony from Joe Silva. The Court had sided with Plaintiffs in preventing Silva to testify about wage share at his evidentiary hearing last month.
Zuffa filed a Motion for Reconsideration seeking that Judge Boulware rethink his decision and allow the testimony and an additional Declaration of Joe Silva affixed to the motion.
#UFC Antitrust testimony of Joe Silva this past Monday. #Zuffa attempts to ask Silva about Wage Share but over Plaintiffs’ objection. Court agrees with objection and prevents the inclusion of testimony. #Zuffa has filed motion for reconsideration pic.twitter.com/5yJ8S7yQ5X
— Jason Cruz (@dilletaunt) September 28, 2019
#Zuffa is seeking a Motion for Reconsideration in the #UFC Antitrust lawsuit based on the Court preventing Joe Silva from testifying about wage share pic.twitter.com/0ZpFUsxQuI
— Jason Cruz (@dilletaunt) September 28, 2019
Zuffa Motion for Reconsider… by Jason Cruz on Scribd
In turn, Plaintiffs filed an Opposition to the Motion which included a Declaration from Joe Silva which indicated that he did not know Zuffa’s event revenues when he negotiated athlete compensation, did not have a budget for athlete compensation or was ever told that he “was spending too much on athletes.”
Plaintiffs in the #UFC Antitrust Lawsuit have filed an Opposition to #Zuffa‘s Motion for Reconsideration to include testimony and a declaration from Joe Silva re not knowing about wage share. This probably the most salient argument IMO pic.twitter.com/6ccw0pNjsS
— Jason Cruz (@dilletaunt) October 9, 2019
Also interesting to note that Plaintiffs point out, #Zuffa never points out Motion for Reconsideration standard in its briefing. Something usually done in practice. The inference is that #UFC has not met threshold for a judge to grant a motion for reconsideration. https://t.co/V4DP5H4irT pic.twitter.com/TkwIVhmSnG
— Jason Cruz (@dilletaunt) October 9, 2019
Payout Perspective:
From a practical viewpoint, unless the moving party can tell the Court that it overlooked legal precedent when it made its ruling, the motion will likely fail. The reason is that it goes before the same person that made the initial ruling. In all likelihood, the Judge is not going to switch course. This could be an issue that may be brought up on appeal if the Court denies (and it likely will) Zuffa’s motion. While it was a little curious that the Court did not allow the testimony, it does come in line with the determination that Silva was not an “expert” witness but a fact witness with knowledge about how Zuffa paid its athletes.
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