The Orioles and Nationals are engaged in a hotly contested legal battle centered around the TV contract the teams agreed to in 2005, according to Eriq Gardner of The Hollywood Reporter.
Orioles, Nationals engaged in massive TV contract legal dispute
The O’s and Nats are not loving thy neighbor.
Patrick Smith
The initial agreement, which was put into place when the Nationals relocated from Montreal to Washington, D.C., required Baltimore and MASN, the Orioles-owned sports network, to pay only minimal rights fees to the Nats through 2011. In 2012, the agreement was supposed to be reconfigured to provide Washington “fair market value,” which the network did not do. That led the Nationals to take the case to an arbitration panel consisting of owners and executives from other teams to seek a bump in pay ranging from $70 to $90 million per year instead of the roughly $29 million they currently receive.
The panel in June ruled in favor of the Nationals, but the Orioles and MASN reportedly ignored the decision, leading to a heated spat that now includes MLB commissioner Bud Selig.
Selig, who played a big part in resolving the 2005 settlement before eventually kicking money to the Nationals to keep them satisfied as the terms of the deal really started to swing in the Orioles’ favor, is none too happy about the decision of the clubs to take the matter to court despite his efforts to make things right for both parties.
“Unfortunately, these efforts have come to naught solely due to your unfathomable inability to agree on a fair division of that value,” Selig wrote in a letter obtained by The Hollywood Reporter. “In my view, neither of you has approached this negotiation with the best interest of the game paramount in your mind.”
The commissioner went on to issue a very real threat to both clubs, promising serious punishment if they continue to go head-to-head in court:
“I want there to be no doubt that, if any party initiates any lawsuit, or fails to act in strict compliance with the procedures set forth in the Agreement concerning the [Revenue Sharing Definitions Committee of Major League Baseball]‘s decision, I will not hesitate to impose the strongest sanctions available to me under the Major League Constitution.”
Instead of adhering to Selig’s wishes, the clubs continued to take jabs at each other via email, and the Orioles went on to accuse the commissioner of “improper financial motives.”
MASN has since filed an appeal to the arbitration panel’s decision. The Nationals, meanwhile, have threatened to terminate the network’s license to broadcast their games.
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