Sports blog information from USA TODAY.
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U.S. Soccer gets its win in its legal battle with the USWNT, but at what cost?
A judge threw out the claim made by the United States women’s national team that they were paid less than the men’s team, and while this can be considered a win for U.S. Soccer, it’s hard to see how anyone wins here.
The ruling came Friday, in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.
While Judge R. Gary Klausner dismissed the claim that the women’s team was paid less than the men’s team, he did say that they could proceed with claims that they had unequal working conditions compared to the men’s team. (This is related to the men’s team flying on charter flights, while the USWNT often flies commercial.)
So, yes, U.S. Soccer got its win in court. There will undoubtedly be appeals and more to come with the claims that remain, but on this day at least, U.S. Soccer got its win.
But the question remains: At what cost?
Carlos Cordeiro is no longer the president of U.S. Soccer — he resigned in disgrace after legal arguments were leaked showing the organization claimed that women were inherently inferior to men when it came to the game of soccer.
U.S. Soccer and the USWNT’s relationship is beyond broken, and I’m not sure how long it will take to rebuild the trust there, or if it ever will be rebuilt.
The federation’s reputation with fans is in the dumpster, perhaps even lower than when the men’s team failed to qualify for the last World Cup.
US Soccer won a textbook pyrrhic victory: they won in court, but everyone who defended their case now has no job, and public opinion of the federation is somehow lower than the day after Couva. Everyone ended up mad, hurt and broken. https://t.co/hzz4eRYwys
— Matt Lichtenstadter (@MattsMusings1) May 2, 2020
If U.S. Soccer is ever going to get over this, they need to take this opportunity to get to the bargaining table, immediately, and come to a resolution. The organization cannot gloat over its win, it cannot assume this puts them in a position of power.
If the USWNT appeals, and this drags on, it’s only going to do more damage.
U.S. Soccer got its win, but if they want to come out of this with any shred of goodwill from the USWNT and its many fans, they need to put aside the pride and negotiate a deal now.
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After seven years, former high school baseball coach John Sauk has finally been freed from the legal entanglements connected to his advice for a former player to slide into third base.
A seven-year legal entanglement over a junior varsity player’s slide into third base may be at an end. On Monday afternoon, 31-year-old John Suk was finally found not liable for the injuries suffered by former Bound Brook High School baseball player Jake Mesar.
The lawsuit in question was connected to an incident where Suk told Mesar to continue running and then slide into third base. He did, but suffered a devastating ankle break in the process of his slide. Mesar and his family later filed a lawsuit seeking damages from Suk and the school district, seeking more than $1 million citing Suk’s alleged negligence.
To be fair, Mesar’s ankle injury proved to be horrific. Here’s more on how that turned out from New Jersey Advance Media:
Even after three surgeries, the ankle was not improving — one doctor even presented amputation as a possible outcome. A specialist from the Hospital for Special Surgery in Manhattan, Robert Rozbruch, found post-traumatic arthritis and signs of necrosis — evidence the bone was dying.
Mesar needed two more surgeries, including one to inject stem cells into the ankle tissue, and he was fit with an external fixator, a stabilizing frame to keep the bones properly positioned. The injury improved, but Rozbruch told the once-active teenager to avoid high-impact activities. Even jogging.
One can understand why Mesar and his family could be upset, but the lawsuit’s conclusion now firmly holds that concern is misplaced.
“(If he had lost) The coaching profession would be under heavy scrutiny for everything that happens’, Suk told New Jersey Advance Media.
“Coaches are going to have to have insurance like doctors have for malpractice. School districts are not going to want to take the risk of having sports.”
Clearly, the judges felt that potential damage was too great to find in favor of Mesar, virtually no matter what happened to the teen.
