Another Nasty Divorce: Rich Rodriguez, West Virginia, and Big-Time Football
The Detroit Free Press’s Shawn Windsor has written a great piece on the nasty contract dispute between Rich Rodriguez, the new football coach at the University of Michigan, and his former employer, West Virginia University. (Disclaimer: he talked with me about the contract dispute, and kindly sent me the current set of filings in the case.) This fight basically takes care of the rest of my semester teaching Contracts – it’s got questions around modification, breach, damages, liquidated damages, requirements to cure… [Update (5 Feb. 2008): Professor Beth Thornburg at SMU Dedman School of Law has a great site with the filings in the case. Thanks to Bill for the pointer!]
For sports fans, this is a question of when coaches can leave their positions for a new job; of whether Rodriguez will be distracted from his work to strengthen the Wolverines’ program; and of whether WVU will be able to maintain its level of success.
For lawyers, this case is great fun: did Rodriguez breach the contract by leaving, or did WVU breach first? Can Rodriguez remove the case to federal court? (Two questions: is he a citizen of Michigan, and does WVU count as a citizen of West Virginia for diversity purposes?) Is the $4 million buyout clause a legitimate liquidated damages provision, or a penalty clause? Why did Rodriguez put up the letter of credit? And since the federal court in West Virginia also draws jurors from that state, is it really a good idea for Rodriguez’s lawyers to say he can’t get a fair trial in Morgantown?
I suspect this case will end with a whimper, not a bang: the parties will settle, money will change hands, and coaches will continue to change jobs. Now if Rodriguez turns into John L. Smith, that will be a big story…
Filed under: Court Decisions, Law School, Media, civil procedure
In my book he breached the contract for sure. These coaches and schools are so lenient in their upholding of contracts as long as money changes hands as you pointed out. If the coach does not want to be there, they have leverage on the school from a “bad PR” stand point.
Too bad that sports more about law and contracts than abbout winning and a good game.
Tricky LC question: what if he put up an LC that required the beneficiary to present a document stating that Rich Rodriguez had done nothing wrong.
What about the requirement to present an “original” and as the 5th cout of appeal just found out, a fax copy at least when using the UCP 400 does not qualify as an original. Taking into account that banks rarely mail originals that LC might be useless. Or excluding the article from the UCP 600 that permits presentation of originals…
If someone wants to play, LCs are the playing field you want to be on.