Minor League Team Says The Yankees And MLB Are Guilty Of Being Bullies

The New York Yankees and Major League Baseball are being sued for “bullying conduct” and failing to carry out on alleged guarantees made.

On December 3, the membership and league had been sued by Nostalgic Partners LLC, which is the proprietor of a baseball staff that, till lately, was a Minor League Baseball affiliate of the MLB group. That staff, the Staten Island Yankees, was left with out affiliation, as a part of MLB’s plan to contract its Minor League Baseball system and scale back the variety of groups to 120 from 160.

Nostalgic Partners LLC claims that it acquired the Staten Island Yankees in 2011 after it was assured that the staff would proceed its affiliation with the MLB staff and proceed to take part within the New York-Penn League, which is a part of the dad or mum membership Yankees’ farm system. It says that it relied on such promise, now to its detriment, and deserves to be compensated hundreds of thousands of money in damages.

“Defendants’ false promises and unlawful conduct have caused the SI Yankees significant harm, in that they have destroyed the SI Yankees’ business model and doomed the SI Yankees to oblivion,” the grievance states. The plaintiff is in search of a minimum of $20 million in reduction from any of eight claimed counts in its grievance, which incorporates causes of motion for breach of contract and promissory estoppel.

“Their suit against the Yankees is baseless in that they’re claiming they had assurances from the Yankees they would ‘always be a minor league partner,’ but that was under the old system in which clubs had PDCs (player development contracts) with the minor leagues,” said Bill Madden of the New York Daily News. “Those have been eliminated. The Staten Island owners also asserted that as recently as last March, Yankee officials were expressing contentment with Staten Island as their affiliate — but that was because the Yankees were one of the few major league teams opposing the contraction plan and hoped the short season rookie leagues would be maintained.”

Ultimately, the case may come right down to what particular assurances had been offered by the New York Yankees and/or MLB to Nostalgic Partners, LLC that allegedly induced the possession group to buy the Staten Island staff. The burden of proof shall be positioned on the plaintiff and, if there isn’t a written correspondence to depend upon in arguing its claims, it may very well be an uphill battle for the very displeased Nostalgic Partners, LLC.

“Defendants can gleefully play the bully, but established law makes them liable for this bullying conduct,” the grievance states.

Darren Heitner is the founding father of Heitner Legal. He is the creator of How to Play the Game: What Every Sports Attorney Needs to Know, revealed by the American Bar Association, and is an adjunct professor on the University of Florida Levin College of Law. You can reach him by electronic mail at heitner@gmail.com and keep track of him on Twitter at @DarrenHeitner.