A Loss for New England Patriots Fans

Following up on Frank’s post about the Bengals suing their fans, here’s a recent contracts case that should, at the very least, give Eagles fans a good laugh.

Yarde Metals, Inc. was a season ticket holder of the New England Patriots for twenty years.  In October 2002, Yarde received a letter from the Patriots’ front office advising that its season ticket privileges had been terminated “effective immediately.”  The reason given: an individual using a ticket from Yarde’s account was ejected from a game for throwing bottles.  Yarde admitted that this particular individual had used one of its tickets to attend the game, but claimed that he had never thrown any bottles.  Instead, Yarde explained that he was ejected from the stadium because he used the women’s restroom (apparently there is/was a widely acknowledged men’s restroom shortage at Gillette Stadium). 

When the Pats wouldn’t restore and renew Yarde’s season tickets, Yarde sued.  Yarde sought to impose liability on the Pats for breach of its “contractual right to season tickets [that included] a contractual right to renew its season tickets annually.”  (Yarde also sought to impose liability on the Patriots based on [in Yarde’s own words] the “doctrine of equitable estoppel [which] prohibits the Patriots from contradicting the expectation of the plaintiff Yarde which the Patriots have created.”).

Yarde lost.  Weighing whether season ticket subscriptions include any protected, implied right to renew annually, the Massachusetts court held that they do not.  Moreover, even if the complaint sufficiently invoked some type of option or implied contract claim, the court held that the Pats’ revocation of Yarde’s tickets would not violate an implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing.

Yarde Metals, Inc. v. New England Patriots Limited Partnership, 2005 Mass. App. LEXIS 904 (Sept. 30, 2005). 

[Meredith R. Miller]