Mike Leach Sues ESPN for Defamation

They could always say that type of football is not what they are looking for.

 

Yeah, I hate coaches who build winning programs from nearly nothing.

If you can win in Lubbock, I can't imagine what he could do in Boulder or Minneapolis. But, they have no interest.

 

Leach probably just wants to go scorched earth and get James fired from ESPN.

 

To be fair, schools might not want to hire someone who is suing his former employer. That's kind of a no-no in the coaching biz, even though I think Leach's situation is different from anything we've really seen before.

 

He also sued James a while ago. I seriously doubt that anyone would consider what Papa James has to say when making a hiring decision.

 

You would hope not, but the "too much baggage" quote that's come out twice I think makes me wonder...

 

I completely agree with this. James should have been removed from anything remotely having to do with Texas Tech or Big 12 football as soon as this story broke. The fact that he had an uncontested platform to speak his mind as a father/party in the dispute during the game was appalling.

How that action by the defendant plays into the outcome of the suit remains to be seen, but it depicts a reckless attitude.

 

Who used that phrase - the ADs of schools that Leach wanted to coach?

 

Frantic said it best ... as a public figure, Leach has a steep hill to climb because he has to show that ESPN acted with actual malice. That they knew what they were reporting was true or acted with a reckless disregard for the truth.

Opinion *may* be protected. The fair comment defense allows for the free expression of opinion. However, it does no protect against false statements of fact. You can say "I think Mike Leach is a bad coach and should be fired" and that's legally fine. You can't say "I think Mike Leach is wrong for keeping a kid locked in an electrical closet" if it didn't happen, because that's a false statement of fact.

It seems to me that this case all comes down to whether or not Leach did those things to James' kid. If he did, I think ESPN's in the clear. If he didn't, and they ignored his requests to take down the story, they're done.

 

Yeah, but did you read what Frantic wrote? The case likely won't even get to the level of being tried on the facts. I think "it all comes down to" a number of other legal factors that would not seem to work in Leach's favor. From what I've read, the facts don't work in his favor, either.

 

Well, here's another way to look at it. Do you trust what's been written about the Leach situation? How many papers cover Texas Tech on a daily basis? I know Dallas and Fort Worth used to fly people in, but I doubt they do that anymore.

I'm sure the football writer from the Avalanche-Journal does a great job, but do you really see many hometown papers really investigating the local team? They don't have the resources to do it even if they wanted to.

Who else is going to find out what really happened? SI? ESPN, oh wait...

The Texas Tech AD was shown up by a coach who was more popular than he was and he was looking for any reason to fire him. It's a lot easier to do when you know ESPN is on your side in the matter.

 

Win or lose - Leach wins either way. He is forcing ESPN to defend one of their announcers who conspired with Tech administration to get Leach fired.
Besides his involvement after the concussion what will also come out is on going interference with program in effort to get his kid on the field.