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Why did Vilma not sue the NFL?

By Rick Karcher, Michael McCann, Geoffrey Rapp, Greg Skidmore, and Howard Wasserman

Mike's SI piece on the Vilma lawsuit got mentioned on Slate's Hang Up and Listen podcast this week. I disagree with a couple of points that Mike makes (and that the HU&L guys largely repeat): I do not believe there is any chance the claim is frivolous, although the issue of whether the whole thing is preempted by the NLRA and the CBA is an interesting one (the answer to which I have no idea). It seems to me that while the CBA gave Goodell a great deal of investigatory and sanction power over the players, it did not give him license to defame players and that possible defamation did not become the subject of bargaining. As to forum, I wrote previously that there is a nice issue of whether Goodell is subject to personal jurisdiction in Louisiana, although the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that the case can be heard there.

But I now want to pose a different question: Why did Vilma sue only Goodell and not the NFL on a respondeat superior theory? The answer depends on two questions that I hope people can answer.

One possibility is that the NFL is a party to the CBA (Goodell is not), so suing the other contracting party makes the possible labor preemption more obvious. Is that possible?

A second possibility is that Vilma wants to be in federal court and was worried that the NFL might somehow destroy complete diversity and thus federal jurisdiction. That explanation depends on my second question: What is the precise organizational status of the National Football League? Is that an independent entity and, if so, what is its form and make-up? Or is it owned by some other entity and, if so, what is the form and make-up of that entity? While the league has its offices in New York, that only matters if it is a corporation; if it is a partnership or a limited liability company, its citizenship is based on the citizenship of all of its partners or members. And if some of those are from Florida (Vilma's home state), this case cannot be in federal court. So who, exactly, does Goodell work for and what is its nature and structure?

And finally, is there any other explanation for not suing the league?

Full post as published by Sports Law Blog on May 30, 2012 (boomark / email).