A former wrestler has purchased the XFL, but its founder and former Commissioner remain in the squared circle of litigation. They’re currently grappling over access to the former Commissioner’s company phone.
Daniel Kaplan of TheAthletic.com reports that the ongoing lawsuit between former XFL Commissioner Oliver Luck and former XFL owner Vince McMahon has focused for now on access to the password to Luck’s company phone.
Luck has sued for the balance of his $35 million contract with the XFL. The XFL contends that it sued Luck for cause, arguing among other things that he used the company-issued iPhone for personal purposes, in violation of company policy.
A hearing will be held later this week on whether Luck must provide the password to the phone.
“The full contents of [the phone] are relevant to showing that Luck was properly terminated for cause under his Employment Contract because he grossly neglected his duties after March 13, 2020 -- when Luck effectively abandoned his responsibilities as XFL Commissioner and CEO and returned home to Indiana despite the existential threat to the league posed by the COVID-19 pandemic,” McMahon’s lawyers wrote in court filings, via Kaplan. “Examination of the data on the iPhone will show Luck’s activities during this critical time period when he was not in the office and demonstrate that he failed to ‘devote substantially all of his business time to the performance of his duties to the XFL’ as required by his Employment Contract.”
McMahon relies on a Connecticut statute that allows employers to access data on company-issued phones, and to require employee passwords for those phones. Luck’s position is supported by the fact that he wasn’t employed by McMahon or Alpha Entertainment, but by the XFL. Luck wisely made McMahon and Alpha express parties to his contract, so that the obligation would survive the bankruptcy filing that ultimately occurred.
Here’s what seems to be actually going on. (In other words, what comes next is opinion, not fact.)
McMahon decided after the pandemic began to scrap the XFL and to sell the carcass, and he wanted to avoid paying the balance of Luck’s contract. Thus, McMahon needed some basis for avoiding the obligation. His lawyers came up with an argument that Luck could be fired for cause, throwing everything possible at the wall in the hope of finding something that would constitute cause.
With $23.8 million on the line, it’s worth a try. Worst case? McMahon pays the money anyway. Best case? He avoids $23.8 million.
Whether it’s right or wrong or ethical or unethical to try to find any reason that the law possibly will regard as semi-plausible to avoid a contractual obligation is irrelevant, unfortunately. This isn’t about doing business in a fair and just manner. This isn’t about honoring promises or engaging in fair and appropriate business practices.
This is about finding a way to avoid paying Luck $23.8 million that was promised to him. Some businesses lump that objective into the “all’s fair in love and war” mantra, even if in many instances it isn’t.
