5th Circuit Court of Appeals

Smashin222

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The Fifth Circuit will review the lower court's judgment under a highly deferential standard called "abuse of discretion." They will have to find a clear misapplication of one of the 4 preliminary injunction factors. In this case it will likely be "likelihood of success on the merits." The judges will have to decide whether Judge Mazzant abused his discretion in finding jurisdiction, standing or that the circumstances here were egregious enough to override the substantial deference afforded to arbitral awards.

Folks talking about "conservatives upholding the law and liberals upholding special interests" have no idea what they're talking about. Please ignore.

Courts tend to support substantial deference to the private arrangements of informed actors. The NFLPA and NFL agreed, through private contract, to arbitration for these issues and bargained for the procedures to govern those arbitrations. Courts are loathe to insert themselves into those contractual arrangements beyond enforcing the awards granted therein. That's why this decision repeatedly mentions the deference given and the "extreme circumstances" presented here.

While the gap between "conservative" and "liberal" justices is often on display on social issues, you can take a look at Supreme Court jurisprudence on arbitration decisions to see that they are often bipartisan and almost always are based on the principle of deference to arbitrators. The list of exceptions underwhich a Court will intervene to overturn an arbitrator's decision are exceedingly slim. ere the question is whether the arbitrator engaged in serious misconduct by not providing Zeke and the NFLPA a full opportunity to defend themselves.

How far a court is willing to go in saying that a proceeding "lacked fundamental fairness" and what constitutes "serious misconduct" is perhaps a question that liberal and conservative judges will disagree about, but I doubt that, if you are not a lawyer, you're really prepared to engage that discussion. My take, is that liberal justices often attempt to preserve or inject external indices of fairness (and thereby imposing obligations or conditions on the arbitration that were not explicitly bargained for) and conservative justices tend to grant deference to the parties' original bargains. But that's no guarantee. Judge Chin was an Obama appointee and upheld Brady. The Supreme Court voted 7-2 to uphold an arbitral award against Argentina in which one party didn't satisfy the conditions to even enter arbitration (and objected to its presence in arbitration the whole way through).

I have no idea how this conversation got so off the rails, but, I repeat, if you're not a lawyer, and you're weighing in with your opinion on issues not listed above, you're distracting and misleading people and you should stop.
 

windjc

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The Fifth Circuit will review the lower court's judgment under a highly deferential standard called "abuse of discretion." They will have to find a clear misapplication of one of the 4 preliminary injunction factors. In this case it will likely be "likelihood of success on the merits." The judges will have to decide whether Judge Mazzant abused his discretion in finding jurisdiction, standing or that the circumstances here were egregious enough to override the substantial deference afforded to arbitral awards.

Folks talking about "conservatives upholding the law and liberals upholding special interests" have no idea what they're talking about. Please ignore.

Courts tend to support substantial deference to the private arrangements of informed actors. The NFLPA and NFL agreed, through private contract, to arbitration for these issues and bargained for the procedures to govern those arbitrations. Courts are loathe to insert themselves into those contractual arrangements beyond enforcing the awards granted therein. That's why this decision repeatedly mentions the deference given and the "extreme circumstances" presented here.

While the gap between "conservative" and "liberal" justices is often on display on social issues, you can take a look at Supreme Court jurisprudence on arbitration decisions to see that they are often bipartisan and almost always are based on the principle of deference to arbitrators. The list of exceptions underwhich a Court will intervene to overturn an arbitrator's decision are exceedingly slim. ere the question is whether the arbitrator engaged in serious misconduct by not providing Zeke and the NFLPA a full opportunity to defend themselves.

How far a court is willing to go in saying that a proceeding "lacked fundamental fairness" and what constitutes "serious misconduct" is perhaps a question that liberal and conservative judges will disagree about, but I doubt that, if you are not a lawyer, you're really prepared to engage that discussion. My take, is that liberal justices often attempt to preserve or inject external indices of fairness (and thereby imposing obligations or conditions on the arbitration that were not explicitly bargained for) and conservative justices tend to grant deference to the parties' original bargains. But that's no guarantee. Judge Chin was an Obama appointee and upheld Brady. The Supreme Court voted 7-2 to uphold an arbitral award against Argentina in which one party didn't satisfy the conditions to even enter arbitration (and objected to its presence in arbitration the whole way through).

I have no idea how this conversation got so off the rails, but, I repeat, if you're not a lawyer, and you're weighing in with your opinion on issues not listed above, you're distracting and misleading people and you should stop.
True. But appeals courts uphold the lower courts decision in most cases.
 

Smashin222

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True. But appeals courts uphold the lower courts decision in most cases.

Absolutely. Abuse of discretion is quite a tall hurdle to pass. Appeals courts in California, Texas, Alabama, Massachusetts, all defer to lower courts substantially under such a standard.

"De novo" review, where a court revisits the issue as if it were new is where you would get concerned. That's not present here.
 
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Absolutely. Abuse of discretion is quite a tall hurdle to pass. Appeals courts in California, Texas, Alabama, Massachusetts, all defer to lower courts substantially under such a standard.

"De novo" review, where a court revisits the issue as if it were new is where you would get concerned. That's not present here.

Not sure I entirely agree. I believe that the court of appeals still applies a de novo standard to questions of law or mixed questions of law and fact. For pure findings of fact, it would apply abuse of discretion. So court of appeals could say Judge Mazzant applied the wrong law or applied the right law the wrong way to the facts, and use a de novo standard and give no deference to his decision. Do you agree? (Btw I'm a lawyer).
 

ConstantReboot

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An appeals court is a fresh start, and will not defer to a lower court's ruling when rendering their verdict (EDIT: unless there is a tie)

An Appeals court is not a fresh start. All sworn testimonies, facts, and evidence do carry over and are reviewed by all parties and will be used in addition to the Appeals proceedings. There will be 3 judges that will 3 judges who will cross examine both parties and will ask even more detailed questions. These judges also will come to consider the harsh language that Judge Mazzant's used in classifying the NFL's treatment of Zeke.

So no its not a fresh start.
 

Beast_from_East

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I don't know if this is for the 5th circuit only or for all the Appeal Circuits, but I read that in roughly 85% of the cases that are appealed from Federal District Court to the Appeals Circuit, the lower court ruling is upheld.

Thus, the NFL only has a 15% chance to win..............of course they are going to argue Brady as the precedent, so who knows.
 

ConstantReboot

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You are partially right. It does come down to three random judges. But what you are willfully overlooking is that each of those judges took an oath to uphold the law and that fundamental fairness is a tried and true standard that has been supported by precedent time and again. And that the appeals court statistically defers to the lower court verdict in roughly 85 percent of all cases.

This case is about fundamental fairness and the league is on the wrong side and is likely going down. They didn't even follow the basic (and broad) jurisdiction afforded them by the CBA.

All judges have to take an oath and uphold the Constitution as the supreme law of the land. The constitution trumps Article 46. Thats the main difference with Brady's case and Zeke's. Brady's case falls under the conduct policy agreement. Zeke's falls under the constitution where his rights as a citizen are being taken away from him.
 

logan

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Lawyer here. The 5th Circuit is concerning for Zeke because it is socially conservative, which usually means pro-business and anti-union. More inclined to uphold the CBA and the power it grants to Goodell.

If that were the case why was the league doing everything they can to drag the case back to "union friendly" NY?
 

tideh20heel

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The granting of an injunction is appealable but they would have to show irreparable harm to the NFL if Zeke doesn't serve the suspension immediately. They can't show that because he can easily serve the suspension at any time if he loses the case.
Zeke playing and the Cowboys doing well is beneficial to the League. The League is harmful to the League so they should suspend themselves for the duration of the CBA until a competent process can be negotiated.
 

Scotman

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I'm as uneducated on this stuff as they come

Based on everything I've come across..the nfl has very small chance to win an appeal..very difficult for them to convince the court there will be irreparable harm if Zeke doesn't serve his suspension now..as he can easily serve it later

Especially after they suspend a guy who was likely never going to play again.

IT'S NEVER TOO LATE!

LOL
 

tideh20heel

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You are partially right. It does come down to three random judges. But what you are willfully overlooking is that each of those judges took an oath to uphold the law and that fundamental fairness is a tried and true standard that has been supported by precedent time and again. And that the appeals court statistically defers to the lower court verdict in roughly 85 percent of all cases.

This case is about fundamental fairness and the league is on the wrong side and is likely going down. They didn't even follow the basic (and broad) jurisdiction afforded them by the CBA.

The League flagrantly violated a CBA that was nearly impossible to for them to violate. They produced according to the judge a "haystack of unfairness" in process where even an attempt at fairness would have secured an ironclad outcome. They took their reputation for shoddy handling of these issues and effectively said "hold my beer".
 

Beast_from_East

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The League flagrantly violated a CBA that was nearly impossible to for them to violate. They produced according to the judge a "haystack of unfairness" in process where even an attempt at fairness would have secured an ironclad outcome. They took their reputation for shoddy handling of these issues and effectively said "hold my beer".

If Goddell would have just invited Kia Roberts to the meeting and after listening to her for 5 mins said,"thanks for the recommendation, but I am going with 6 games".........case closed and courts would say it's Goddell's discretion.

My point is that even pretending to be fair would have been enough, and the even botched that.
 

GhostOfPelluer

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If Goddell would have just invited Kia Roberts to the meeting and after listening to her for 5 mins said,"thanks for the recommendation, but I am going with 6 games".........case closed and courts would say it's Goddell's discretion.

My point is that even pretending to be fair would have been enough, and the even botched that.
I'm not so sure. That wouldn't have solved the fundamental fairness issues. That was only one instance in a series of bungling in this case.
 

Pants

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I'm not so sure. That wouldn't have solved the fundamental fairness issues. That was only one instance in a series of bungling in this case.
gave you a like for proper use of the word "bungling"....it is a seldom used, and yet often needed when dealing with Goodell
 

CowboyStar88

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The interpretation and application of law is variable and bendable, that's the American legal system. Which is why entities like the NFL and NFLPA (and of course business, ACLU, etc) fight so hard to get cases heard by certain courts.

And why everyone gets so animated about who is appointed to courts, especially SCOTUS. If it didn't matter, why would either conservative or liberals care who was on the SCOTUS?

Look I get why people are so animated over it, but that's not my point. My point people think one side is all about the law and order, and the other isn't is asinine.

Boy, people need to read what I wrote again.
 
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