Legal News

Baseball?s Lovable Losers Square Off Against Under Armour

By Dan Slater

For those of you who thought Chicago was all about political corruption and spine-eating attorneys, today brings good news from the Windy City: The Cubbies, baseball’s lovable losers, have a new prospective owner, writes Matt Futterman, the Journal’s sports reporter. (Here’s more from the Chicago Trib.) (And while we were at it, we couldn’t pass up the chance to run a photo of Leon “Bull” Durham, our favorite Cubbie of all time.)

The Ricketts family, whose patriarch, J. Joe Ricketts, founded TD Ameritrade, has scored the winning bid with an offer of nearly $900 million. If the deal wins approval from Major League Baseball, and if the family can close during the next 60-90 days, the Ricketts family will own the Cubs — as well as a lawsuit.

Yesterday, the Cubs sued athletic apparel maker Under Armour, Inc. for breach of contract and promissory estoppel over a marketing agreement gone awry. (LB NB: We recently purchased Under Armour lowers so we could jog in Prospect Park this winter. While we were a little alarmed by the price, we’ve been happy with product.)

Here’s the suit, which was filed by Sonnenschein’s James Klenk in the Northern District of Illinois. The Cubs want more than $10.8 million for the breach of contract claim, and an order enjoining Under Armour from denying the existence of the contract.

David Fish — an Illinois lawyer who helped Ted Williams’ daughter recover a stolen baseball that was autographed by Babe Ruth for Ted Williams, and who sent us the suit — told the Law Blog: “How does one respond to an allegation [in paragraph five] that the ‘The Chicago Cubs are a successful professional baseball team?’ ”

In an e-mail, a spokeswoman for Under Armour wrote: “Under Armour entered into a three-year agreement with the previous management of the Chicago Cubs . . This past summer the Cubs new management sent us a letter terminating the agreement after the second year. Unfortunately, we were unable to agree upon terms for a new deal and one was never signed.”

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on January 23, 2009 (boomark / email).