George Kittle of the San Francisco 49ers makes a catch for a first down against the Washington Commanders during the third quarter of the game at Levi's Stadium on October 19, 2026 in Santa Clara, California Photo by Lachlan Cunningham/Getty Images Logo text A federal appeals court has revived a verdict that the National Football League overcharged Sunday Ticket subscribers and ordered a new trial on damages.
The decision from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday reversed a federal judge who had tossed a $4.7 billion award for consumers. A jury’s “verdict must stand unless it is clearly not supported by the evidence,” the court wrote.
The long running legal battle centers on allegations that the league and its 32 teams conspired in violation of antitrust laws to allow the NFL to reach exclusive deals with broadcast partners for the right to air out-of-market games.
After a jury sided with consumers in a 2024 trial, the court granted the NFL’s bid to throw out the verdict. U.S. District Judge Philip Gutierrez found that some of the testimony from experts who testified should’ve been excluded.
In Friday’s decision, the federal appeals court concluded that Gutierrez overstepped in her role as a gatekeeper of expert testimony.
“Opinions are neither unfounded nor unreliable merely because they are impeachable,” the three-judge panel wrote. “Such opinions are for the jury to weigh at trial.”
Gutierrez’s reasoning to overturn the jury’s verdict was grounded in testimony from Daniel Rascher.
Rascher used college football as a comparison for what would happen in the absence of the broadcasting restraints at issue in the case. Without the NFL’s exclusive arrangements, he testified that individual teams and conferences could sell their out-of-market game rights separately, as colleges do.
Gutierrez ultimately found that Rascher’s work was too speculative.
The appeals court, however, said that the lower court abused its discretion by excluding Rascher’s findings. “Reasonable jurors may debate whether college and professional football telecasts are sufficiently similar or how out-of-market NFL games would have become available in the absence of the NFL’s anticompetitive conduct,” the court wrote. “But those questions are for the jury to decide. Dr. Rascher’s testimony was admissible.”
The case now goes back to district court. The $4.7 billion verdict can’t stand because the jury’s finding on damages wasn’t based on a proper consideration of the evidence, the appeals court ruled.
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