Mike Leach Sues ESPN for Defamation

I'm not sure Leach is a "winner" if he can't get another job in a BCS conference. Two years ago he probably could have been a top candidate for just about any opening. Now he can't get a sniff from Colorado or Minnesota.

 

Even if Leach is in the right, you can only lawyer up so much before nobody else is willing to take a chance on you.

 

Agree. I think Leach is in the right, but if he wants to coach a BCS conference school again, he would be smart to drop his lawsuits.

 

But a coach who can turn around a program can make a school so much $$ that someone has to take the risk at some point, right?

 

Co - defendant in law suit is non other than Spaeth Communications - Famous for "Swift Boating" John Kerry.

Wonder if Leach will call ESPN Ombudsmen Don Ohlmeyer to the stand:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=ohlmeyer_don&id=4844048

 

Interesting that Spaeth is involved with this, given James' intentions (at least last January) of running as a Republican for the U.S. Senate seat Kay Bailey Hutchison is vacating in '12. Wonder if this killed Craig's political career.

 

Adam James deposition does not help his cause and does a lot to help Leach:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/25/sports/ncaafootball/25leach.html?_r=1&pagewanted=2

James said in the deposition that he was locked in the closet, but also said he meant that he felt locked in more than that he was literally locked in. James also testified that Leach’s actions did not put him in medical harm.

Adam James’s accounts in the deposition vary from describing Leach’s handling of his situation as “funny” and “humorous” to feeling like a “prisoner” and a “slave.”


Leach said there had been other discipline problems with James during the year, including James’s breaking a door in the football offices, which cost more than $1,000 to replace, after he was demoted to the third team.

Leach and James agree that on Dec. 17, James was placed in the equipment shed — in some places in the deposition it is referred to as a garage — by the head trainer, Steve Pincock. Leach testified that he did not specifically instruct James to go there but said he had no problem with it as James needed to be in a dark place because of his sensitivity to light. (The space is big enough that the offensive linemen go there during special-teams drills to eat ice.)

James said he was monitored by a trainer, went to the bathroom at one point and “thought the idea of it was funny.”

James said he went into the electrical closet for part of the Dec. 19 practice.

James said in his deposition that Pincock took him to the media room and said, “I want you to stay here.” James testified that because Pincock was standing near the electrical closet when he said “stay here,” it was his “assumption” that he was supposed to enter the closet.

“Nobody held my hand and put me in there, no,” James said of the electrical closet. He also added, “Nobody said, ‘Adam, stay in the media room.’ ”