(02-14-2022 06:28 PM)Luckyshot Wrote: (02-14-2022 06:02 PM)tanqtonic Wrote: (02-14-2022 05:30 PM)mturn017 Wrote: (02-14-2022 05:16 PM)tanqtonic Wrote: (02-14-2022 04:50 PM)Twon Wrote: No, as explain many times before it is the responsibility of the breaching party to take action. WVU filed suit to leave 10 months early. SB3 issued a public statement 3 days ago.
CUSA is following the contractual bylaws and has publicly stated that. It doesn’t matter if SB3 told CUSA it was leaving in December that will have no bearing or consideration
Pretty basic common law across all 48 states
A tad of a disagreement. Negotiating to leave, or throwing numbers out in trying to leave isnt a breach. A party needs a breach in this case.
The letters of a few days ago were the step that was needed for breach.
My guess is that the lawsuits will be filed this week seeking specific performance in light of those letter.
So the private letters they sent in December stating their intent to breach don’t count? Just the public statements? I highly doubt that’s the case. So them sitting on their hands for two months and making a conference schedule that includes the three schools in question, good or bad for their request of injunction? Certainly there’s a point in time where the arbiter would look at them and say “you should have done this a long time ago” and deny it right?
I personally don’t think they want us in the conference next year, they’re just incompetent.
You admitted that the letters contained offers.
There is a huge difference between 'I am going to leave effective xyz' and one that says 'will 100 bucks keep me from being sued if I leave effective xyz ---- sign on the dotted line to give me a full release'.
If I get the first, yep, I know its a breach and I would tell a client that it is a breach.
If I get the second, odds are I would tell them to ignore it --- if they want more dont even respond.
If I was sending the second letter, I would do my damndest to steer it away from a clear breach. Most of the time it is not the client's best interest to give your putative opponent a free walk into court as an aggrieved party right off the bat. You might word it, 'we have the opportunity to make a break with conference effective xyz date, and would a payment of 100 quatloos keep you from storming into court on xyz date'?
But, none of us have the real letters that went back and forth, do we? I dont know if anyone (aside from the people that wrote/sent/received/ read the letters can give us much more, so you might be a little off base with your characterization above that they 'stated a clear and articulable intent to breach' no matter what.
Your last paragraph is exactly what I was going to say. My impression from what was released Friday is that the schools told C-USA they were leaving this summer and understood that required breaking the contract and then had an offer. Having been involved in similar situations before though, I can see how your assumption might be correct. Without the December information we don't know. Given all three are public universities, someone will Freedom of Information those soon enough!
And, to flesh it out further -- -CUSA is under *no* obligation to consider any offer less or different than what was agreed to in the bylaws. Zero, zilch, nada, null set.
Even if there was a clear declaration of intent to breach.
The idea seems to be coming from some about 'how bad it was' to get a non-response. Tough patooties.
If CUSA gets the injunction, the SB3 are really put between a rock and a hard place. Ruh roh, spaghetti-o. Bummer.
And the lawyer from Fla is correct in that in normal situations, specific performance is frowned on. Correctomundo.
But the more unique the situation, and more unique the issue at hand, the more it is looked at favorably. So how unique is this agreement? Seems to me there are 9 such agreements total in the nation. So...... pretty unique actually.
How unique is the relationship in the agreement? Well the relationship is providing for opponents across a wide spectrum of Division 1 athletics and governance of conference athletics. Seems to this ol' tinder brain that there arent that many entities that can be parties to the agreement, that cover damages wont really do, and that the fucntions provided by the breaching parties are quite unique -- most likely irreplaceable and very hard to quantify in monetary damages.
So, my guess is that the CUSA bylaws is correct --- specific performance *is* the perfect way to assess damages. It really is probably the only way to make the non-breaching parties truly whole, in fact.
So I wouldnt be wholly surprised to see a judge enjoin the SB3 from leaving, and only leaving according to the terms of the bylaws. Suck it up, play a few games, and move on.
So given that, I understand why CUSA refused to 'counter'. Those evil bastiges.......