Judge Says We're Bad But We're Right

[sue71, esq]

My apologies if this has already been posted...

"The Blue Devils backed out of a four-game series against the Cardinals with three dates remaining. The contract called for a penalty of $150,000 a game if a date with a "team of similar stature" could not be arranged.

Duke argued that its team, which is 6-45 the past five seasons, was so bad that any team would be a suitable replacement.

The judge sided with Duke."


Click here for more.
(http://thewizardofodds.blogspot.com/2008/06/judge-makes-it-official-duke-is.html)

[pfrduke]

My apologies if this has already been posted...

"The Blue Devils backed out of a four-game series against the Cardinals with three dates remaining. The contract called for a penalty of $150,000 a game if a date with a "team of similar stature" could not be arranged.

Duke argued that its team, which is 6-45 the past five seasons, was so bad that any team would be a suitable replacement.

The judge sided with Duke."


Click here for more.
(http://thewizardofodds.blogspot.com/2008/06/judge-makes-it-official-duke-is.html)

Brilliant legal strategy. Plus, Louisville's time to appeal will have run out by the time we make a bowl game this year ;) (hey, a guy can dream, right?:D)

[speedevil]

My apologies if this has already been posted...

"The Blue Devils backed out of a four-game series against the Cardinals with three dates remaining. The contract called for a penalty of $150,000 a game if a date with a "team of similar stature" could not be arranged.

Duke argued that its team, which is 6-45 the past five seasons, was so bad that any team would be a suitable replacement.

The judge sided with Duke."


Click here for more.
(http://thewizardofodds.blogspot.com/2008/06/judge-makes-it-official-duke-is.html)


r u talking about stanford vs duke. did the blue devils back out because johnny dawkins is the new coach

[pfrduke]

r u talking about stanford vs duke. did the blue devils back out because johnny dawkins is the new coach

Louisville. Football. We did not have a 6-45 record in basketball.

[CLT Devil]

Summary judgement, brilliant! They basically argued that we are the bottom of the barrel and are easily replaced...the Kentucky judge agreed.

[JasonEvans]

In fairness to Lousiville, this is a terrible argument and I am surprised the judge fell for it. Duke is a big-name school from a BCS conference school with a large fan base across the nation. Granted, that fan base does not really travel very much for football games but there are going to be more Duke football fans within 50 miles of Lousiville than -- for example -- fans of Northern Illinois or some of the smaller Championship Subdivision teams that sometimes play BCS schools.

Additionally, in terms of selling tickets to your own fans, there is more prestige in playing an ACC team or any team from a BCS conference than there is in playing a team from a no-name conference. As an added bonus, because duke's basketball team is so well-known and successful, many non-Duke fans across the nation take extra joy in pounding the Duke football team. I am sure Lousiville, a team that would consider itself one of the elite teams that are constantly comparing themselves to Duke in basketball, would take entra delight in playing (and beating) the Duke football team.

Look, I am glad we won this court case and see the argument we made from a competitive standpoint but you cannot tell me that a game against Duke and a game against any number of lesser-known teams would do the same in terms of attendance, fan satisfaction, and local TV/radio ratings. No way.

--Jason "this arguement will be moot in a few years... I hope!" Evans

[weezie]

Man, this is pitiful.
I'm sure pulling for Cut and the boys!

[Edouble]

r u talking about stanford vs duke. did the blue devils back out because johnny dawkins is the new coach

Cardinals, not Cardinal

[Jarhead]

Cardinals, not Cardinal
Swing and a miss. Sorry to interrupt things, but Stanford is "The Stanford Cardinal."

[ohioguy2]

Swing and a miss. Sorry to interrupt things, but Stanford is "The Stanford Cardinal."

Yep, the shade of red, not the type of bird.

[Indoor66]

Swing and a miss. Sorry to interrupt things, but Stanford is "The Stanford Cardinal."

Also sorry to interrupt, but both are correct! The thread is about a suit between Duke and the University of Louisville Cardinals.

[DoubleDuke Dad]

My apologies if this has already been posted...

"The Blue Devils backed out of a four-game series against the Cardinals with three dates remaining. The contract called for a penalty of $150,000 a game if a date with a "team of similar stature" could not be arranged.

Duke argued that its team, which is 6-45 the past five seasons, was so bad that any team would be a suitable replacement.

The judge sided with Duke."


Click here for more.
(http://thewizardofodds.blogspot.com/2008/06/judge-makes-it-official-duke-is.html)


If someone decides to make a movie about Duke Football, will they call it “Legally Bad”? :)

[Edouble]

Swing and a miss. Sorry to interrupt things, but Stanford is "The Stanford Cardinal."

Yeah, that's what I wrote. What are you talking about?!?!?

[Scorp4me]

I loved seeing the comments from the Carolina fans. Someone should really save them for when we beat them this year.

[bhd28]

I loved seeing the comments from the Carolina fans. Someone should really save them for when we beat them this year.

I am with you.... but I do think that dropping out on the series was a pretty bad move and definitely makes Duke look bad (unless there was something going on behind the scenes that I don't know about). What was the school's reasoning for dropping out? I haven't been able to find it.

[OZZIE4DUKE]

I am with you.... but I do think that dropping out on the series was a pretty bad move and definitely makes Duke look bad (unless there was something going on behind the scenes that I don't know about). What was the school's reasoning for dropping out? I haven't been able to find it.

I think it had to do with "easing" the schedule a bit. So we scheduled Alabama and Notre Dame in Louisville's place.

I think Coach Cutcliffe must be absolutely livid with Duke's lawyer's strategy. And so am I. Better to have paid the $450,000 fee to Louisville to make this go away rather than probably the same to the lawyers and being embarrassed by the admission.

[murpho]

I don't see why Coach would care about this at all. This is a judgment on the team prior to his involvement and frankly the Duke lawyer's argument is correct.
Don't agree with forking over 450k just to try avoid saying something we all know is true.

[bhd28]

I think it had to do with "easing" the schedule a bit. So we scheduled Alabama and Notre Dame in Louisville's place.

I think Coach Cutcliffe must be absolutely livid with Duke's lawyer's strategy. And so am I. Better to have paid the $450,000 fee to Louisville to make this go away rather than probably the same to the lawyers and being embarrassed by the admission.

I am with you 100% Ozzie. Bad form with the schedule IMHO, but they definitely made it 100X worse with going to court over it. Fortunately, Duke has done well financially over the past years. The $$ saved was likely not worth the combo of legal fees and bad publicity. Talk about adding insult to injury... sheesh!:(

[Jim3k]

This isn't a bad thing, IMO. It may have some local traction, but nationally it is simply a 'smile' story. It will have no impact on Cutcliffe who can spin it easily. It will have no impact on the team which will do whatever it does in the field. If the team does well, it will be only an amusing anecdote. If they do poorly...well, the lawyer was right.

Plus, it saved old DU a bunch of money. The summary judgment tack was the right way to go. It avoids a trial where that defense would gain more pub than something done by motion.

I think it is incorrect to say that the right hand didn't know what the left was doing. This is simply good lawyering. This is a big ho hum.

[speedevil]

Louisville. Football. We did not have a 6-45 record in basketball.

thanks for the confusion, i thought this was dukebasketballreport.com

[Edouble]

I think it is incorrect to say that the right hand didn't know what the left was doing. This is simply good lawyering. This is a big ho hum.

HO HUM

[CameronCrazy'11]

This story just got picked up on MSNBC by Duke alumni Dan Abrams. He called it a "loss" for Duke, but said he still loves Duke football.

[SilkyJ]

I don't see why Coach would care about this at all. This is a judgment on the team prior to his involvement and frankly the Duke lawyer's argument is correct.
Don't agree with forking over 450k just to try avoid saying something we all know is true.

I dunno. I guess it depends on how much 450k really is in the grand scheme of things. You can compare it to the endowment if you want, in which case its a pretty insignificant amount, but I don't think that's what you should compare it to. If you look at it as a football cost, Duke had $9mm in revenue so 450k is 5% of revenue and I don't know the past history that well, but I know we've lost money in recent years, as recently as 2006 I know for sure...

http://www.roanoke.com/sports/vtfootball/wb/162880

[gus]

I think it had to do with "easing" the schedule a bit. So we scheduled Alabama and Notre Dame in Louisville's place.

I think Coach Cutcliffe must be absolutely livid with Duke's lawyer's strategy. And so am I. Better to have paid the $450,000 fee to Louisville to make this go away rather than probably the same to the lawyers and being embarrassed by the admission.

i don't know. There are so many better ways to spend 450K. I'd rather give a dozen students free rides than drop 450k to avoid admitting what everyone already knows.

[bhd28]

i don't know. There are so many better ways to spend 450K. I'd rather give a dozen students free rides than drop 450k to avoid admitting what everyone already knows.
But what it is really "admitting" is that Duke is, in effect, the worst team in D-I AND that they will CONTINUE to be the worst for the next 3 years. Is that a message you really want sent? Hopefully Coach Cut can use that as motivation, but man, that is rough.

[cspan37421]

seems to me a lot depends on the wording of the contract. I think there was an out for Duke in that the contract did allow them to get out if L'ville could find a suitable replacement. Did they define "suitable replacement" in the contract? Does suitable mean "highly desired to schedule for homecoming" or "a team from a BCS conference"? etc? So many ways to define it.

If L'ville didn't define it then they got what they deserved - a judge's opinion about what suitable means.

I have a hard time feeling bad for them, having been on the quad in '86.