The plot continues to thicken in the lawsuit brought by Michael Avenatti following the late cancellation of the Hall of Fame Game between the Green Bay Packers and Indianapolis Colts earlier this month.
After he filed an initial lawsuit 11 days ago, Avenatti continues to take it to the Hall of Fame and the NFL. This time, he is now claiming to have evidence that the league defrauded its fans by knowingly allowing the fans to enter the stadium and at the same time knowing the game was unlikely to be played.
Ironically, it appears that the NFL’s drug testers’ favorite punter, Pat McAfee of the Colts, may have provided the firepower for the latest claim by Avenatti. That’s because McAfee appeared on a podcast the day after the cancelled game and talked about the lead-up to the cancellation.
According to Pro Football Talk, here are McAfee’s comments:
‘There was a big ‘no tweeting’ policy, like nobody’s allowed to say sh-t,” McAfee said regarding instructions provided after the teams were told about the cancellation of the game.
McAfee also characterized comments from Hall of Fame president David Baker in this way: “This is gonna be a big f—king problem.”
“They let everybody into the stadium,” McAfee said. “I think that was the issue. So they let everybody into the stadium before telling them it was being canceled.”
Initially, the lawsuit that was brought only claimed that the league had breached the contracts created by the purchase of tickets to the event. At the time of the filing, 11 days ago, Avenatti did note that he could be adding other claims once more evidence could be gathered.
Avenatti certainly appears interested in what McAfee had to say as part of another claim he may be adding — fraud.
“This recording together with other evidence shows that there was a deliberate and collective effort to hide information from the fans until the last possible moment,” Avenatti said. “The league and the Hall wanted to have as many fans enter the stadium as possible and spend money on concessions, etc. before being told the truth. In the law, this is called ‘fraud.’”
For its part, the Hall of Fame and the NFL have tried hard to make this situation go away and not have to deal with a class of litigants against it like it did following the no-seat fiasco at Super Bowl XLV. They at first offered face-value for the tickets that were purchased.
Last week, the group upped the ante and were offering an enhanced package of goods in addition to the face-value refund for the tickets. Of course, the catch being that anyone who wanted in on those deals were not eligible for the lawsuit that is currently going forward.
Will fans be patient and wait out what could be a protracted legal battle, or will most take up the NFL on its recent offer?
Either way, it appears Avenatti is ready to go to battle against the NFL and its war chest of funds to fight this battle.
