When the New York Giants crossed the Hudson River to play in the New Jersey Meadowlands in 1976 and the New York Jets followed eight years later, neither team opted to place “New Jersey” in its official name. This created conflicting feelings among New Jerseyans who were delighted to host two NFL teams but regarded their continuing identification with New York as “offsides.”
Fans on the New Jersey side of the Hudson did not file a legal action to force a name change; they bought season tickets instead.
Decades later, an effort to compel the Jets and Giants to change their names came from an unlikely source: New York football fans who filed a lawsuit in 2022 alleging that the Jets, the Giants, and the NFL are engaging in consumer fraud. The class action (read: seeking billions in punitive damages) asserts that ticketholders were misled into believing the teams played in Manhattan, and they would not have bought tickets if they had known about the arduous 20-minute trek from mid-town into northern New Jersey.
Really, that is what they alleged. They not only sought damages, but asked the U.S. District Court in Manhattan for an order forcing the teams to remove all references to New York from their names, logos, and advertising.
In Suero v. NFL, 2022 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 228206 (December 16, 2022), the court considered the plaintiffs’ claims in a motion to dismiss the complaint pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.
The “Ten Lies”
The plaintiffs are residents of New York City who alleged they were deceived into believing that the Jets and Giants played their home games in New York and/or were inconvenienced in traveling to New Jersey to attend a game. How so?
The Amended Complaint set forth “Ten Lies,” including that the Jets and Giants are New York teams and that their home stadium, MetLife Stadium, sets the standard for venue excellence and is under 20 minutes from New York City. The tenth lie “is the MetLife logo, which consists of the words ‘MetLife Stadium’ beneath the New York Skyline”; this allegedly misrepresents that the stadium is located in New York City. Seriously?
The Allegations
The plaintiffs alleged that the representations of the Jets, the Giants, and the NFL amount to false advertising and fraud. The defendants brought a motion to dismiss the amended complaint, which is essentially asking the court to dismiss the case at a very early stage.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Moses considered the parties’ arguments and presented a written recommendation to the presiding judge, Alvin Hellerstein.
The Arguments
The plaintiffs argued that while other NFL teams play outside the city for which they are named, the Jets and Giants are the only teams that play in an entirely different state. They cited various laws restricting product labels, including a Vermont statute regulating the use of “Vermont maple”; they likened the Jets and Giants to “corn syrup being falsely labeled Vermont Maple Syrup.”
This was a rather clever ploy, but the plaintiffs’ game plan was akin to a flea-flicker with one-too-many handoffs. Trick plays can be fun, but if an offense gets too cute it results in mistakes.
Conversely, the defendants did not need to mount a legal blitz; they simply argued that the plaintiffs failed to address the obvious weaknesses in their case.
The Decision
Turnovers will kill a team’s chances in the course of a big game. It seems the plaintiffs fumbled at least three times in the litigation. First, the plaintiffs failed to provide the citizenship of the defendants in their pleadings filed with the court. Since the plaintiffs did not show that the parties are domiciled in different states, the magistrate found that the court did not have the authority or jurisdiction to hear the case [under 28 U.S.C. Section 1332(a)(1)]. (The court noted that the Jets, the Giants, and the NFL are all domiciled in New York and the parties must be based in different states for a federal court to have jurisdiction.)
Second, the defendants argued that the plaintiffs dropped the ball by failing to allege that the NFL was responsible for promoting any of the so-called Ten Lies. The plaintiffs failed to address the issue in their opposing brief, thereby abandoning their claims against the NFL.
The third fumble was the plaintiffs’ failure to state a claim under the New York General Business Law (Section 349) which prohibits advertising that is “misleading in any respect.” A complaint for false advertising or deceptive acts must allege that the challenged transaction was consumer-oriented, involved materially misleading practices, and caused injury.
While the plaintiffs alleged that the defendants’ use of New York in their names or in the MetLife stadium logo was confusing, they did not raise any facts tending to show that the conduct was likely to confuse reasonable consumers. It is not enough to claim that a plaintiff was misled; a complaint must allege facts showing that “a significant portion of the general consuming public…acting reasonably in the circumstances” could be similarly misled. (This is often achieved in trademark cases through consumer surveys.)
To support its recommendation to dismiss the action, the magistrate noted that there is nothing remarkable about professional sports teams moving to the suburbs while retaining the name of the city where it formerly played. The court also noted that the MetLife Stadium website indicated that the facility is located in New Jersey.
Further, the plaintiffs did not allege they suffered any material harm from the alleged deception. (Sorry New Yorkers, but sitting in traffic on the George Washington Bridge or in the Lincoln Tunnel to New Jersey is not considered a legal injury.)
Finally, the court found that the plaintiffs’ reliance on National Football League Properties, Inc. v. New Jersey Giants, 637 F. Supp. 507 (D.N.J. 1986), was misplaced. There, the Giants brought a trademark claim against a company that called itself New Jersey Giants, Inc., and sold unlicensed apparel bearing the mark “New Jersey GIANTS” in direct competition with the team’s sales of licensed NFL merchandise bearing the New York Giants marks.
The New York Giants routed the New Jersey Giants when the court found that “NEW YORK GIANTS” and related marks were “valid,” “nationally recognized,” or “might conceivably be misunderstood by some few consumers.”
In contrast, the New York plaintiffs here suffered a shutout. Magistrate Moses did not find that any of the Ten Lies were likely to mislead reasonable consumers and she recommended a dismissal of all claims.
The Epilogue
- The litigation was halted for a review from Judge Hellerstein, as the magistrate’s recommendation to grant the motion to dismiss did not constitute a binding decision.
- The plaintiffs punted before the court issued a final ruling when they agreed to a stipulation of dismissal of all claims with prejudice and without payment of any legal fees or court costs.