{"id":378383,"date":"2025-12-31T01:28:21","date_gmt":"2025-12-31T01:28:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/378383\/"},"modified":"2025-12-31T01:28:21","modified_gmt":"2025-12-31T01:28:21","slug":"nascar-likely-paid-millions-for-antitrust-trial-settlement-say-legal-experts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/378383\/","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR likely paid millions for antitrust trial settlement, say legal experts"},"content":{"rendered":"

NASCAR likely paid out millions of dollars in damages to get 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports to end their antitrust trial<\/a>, according to two antitrust experts, but the move gave the sanctioning body certainty instead of leaving its future up to a judge and jury.<\/p>\n

Meegan Hollywood, an antitrust litigator of the Shinder, Cantor & Lerner law firm, told Sports Business Journal that she expects NASCAR paid out 10% to 25% of the $365 million in damages<\/a> requested by 23XI and Front Row. A second antitrust lawyer who requested anonymity to speak freely said it was unlikely the teams settled for less than 50%.<\/p>\n

A 10% settlement would have been $36.5 million, while 50% would have been $182.5 million.<\/p>\n

NASCAR and the teams are believed to have spent millions on lawyers. 23XI and Front Row hired Winston & Strawn, while NASCAR used Latham & Watkins. Hollywood estimated both sides might have combined for as much as $50 million in lawyer fees, while the second attorney thought the figure could be closer to double that amount.<\/p>\n

Hollywood noted that the specter of NASCAR facing a billion-dollar damages fee is \u201cbet-the-company or bet-the-sports-franchise type of money, so it\u2019s potential for a huge financial loss if the jury finds that way and it\u2019s tripled, so there\u2019s that risk.\u201d<\/p>\n

In addition to the likely settlement payment, the teams said NASCAR granted evergreen charter provisions along with improved governance terms.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I suspect also that this particular settlement allowed them to have a little bit more control in the changes that they made to the charter system,\u201d Hollywood said, \u201cbecause in addition to the sort of financial risk, NASCAR did run the risk of having court-mandated changes and then they sort of would have had to do that not on their own terms. This probably allowed them to make certain changes on their own terms and have some more internal control.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Judge got it right\u2019<\/p>\n

Heading into the trial, one element seemingly put NASCAR at a disadvantage: U.S. District Court judge Kenneth Bell\u2019s ruling that NASCAR was a monopsony because of language it used in a now-dismissed countersuit he said effectively admitted that status. It left the jury to determine only whether NASCAR had used its powers illegally and if it hurt the teams.<\/p>\n

As a result, the plaintiffs\u2019 witnesses and lawyers frequently referred to NASCAR as a monopoly throughout the case with no ability for the defense to challenge the statement and change the jury\u2019s thinking.<\/p>\n

NASCAR tried to argue that it competes with other forms of motorsports like F1 and IndyCar, but antitrust lawyers often try to argue there are distinct sub-genres within broader categories — a belief the judge appeared to agree with. According to Hollywood, \u201cThat gave the plaintiffs a bit of a leg up.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt seems to me that stock car racing would be its own market,\u201d Hollywood said. \u201cI get what [NASCAR was] saying in terms of it competing with Formula 1, but I do think there are a lot of differences there as well. There could be some overlap with sponsors, but also not, and overlap with audience, but also not, or sort of where you\u2019re competing for media rights is different — so there are some nuances there where I think probably the judge got it right.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Smoking gun\u2019 moments<\/p>\n

Both sides had to contend with embarrassing emails and text messages coming out through the discovery phase.<\/p>\n

In one instance when discussing the now-defunct but then-fledgling Superstar Racing Experience, NASCAR Commissioner Steve Phelps said NASCAR should \u201cstick a knife in this trash series.\u201d Asked if texts like that could provide a \u201csmoking gun\u201d that makes it difficult for any defense lawyer to overcome, the second antitrust litigator noted that juries can sometimes have trouble keeping up with the minutiae of complicated antitrust law, so they\u2019ll naturally look out for things they can understand such as text messages.<\/p>\n

Hollywood said the text \u201ccertainly wasn\u2019t pretty for them, but ultimately it\u2019s so hard to tell with how a jury is going to interpret any single piece of evidence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes I look at things, and I\u2019m like this is a smoking gun,\u201d Hollywood added, \u201cand I then I go into a deposition, and I put it in front of a witness, and they have a totally different plausible story about it, and I\u2019m like, \u2018Oh man.\u2019 So you really never know.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hollywood said NASCAR will likely receive advice from lawyers on how to adjust its contracts and rules to avoid future anti-trust litigation, such as altering the non-compete clauses it currently has with race tracks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NASCAR likely paid out millions of dollars in damages to get 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":378384,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,634,82],"class_list":["post-378383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nascar","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nascar","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=378383"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378383\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/378384"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=378383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=378383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=378383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}