by: Chandler Vessels 9 minutes ago ChandlerVessels
Jon Gruden is looking forward to the chance to challenge the NFL and Roger Goodell in a courtroom. On Monday, the Nevada Supreme Court ruled in favor of Gruden, blocking arbitration in his lawsuit against the league and its commissioner.
That will open the door for Gruden to have his case heard in court. He made his first public comments since the news in a statement to ESPN on Tuesday.
“I’m looking forward to having the truth come out and I want to make sure what happened to me doesn’t happen to anyone else,” Gruden said. “…What happened wasn’t right and I’m glad the court didn’t let the NFL cover it up.”
Gruden initially sued the NFL and Goodell in 2021 for leaking emails from Gruden containing racist, homophobic and mysogynistic remarks to multiple media outlets during an investigation into the Washington franchise. Gruden contended that the emails were leaked to cause his firing as the coach of the Las Vegas Raiders. Gruden resigned from the Raiders in October 2021 while the team was 3-1.
He initially won before the trial court, but filed a motion to compel after the court ruled that the case would be decided through arbitration. The Nevada Supreme Court voted 5-2 in his favor Monday, finding that the NFL’s arbitration clause in its Constitution and Bylaws “is unconscionable and does not apply to Gruden as a former employee.”
“By its own unambiguous language, the NFL Constitution no longer applies to Gruden,” the five justices wrote. “If the NFL Constitution were to bind former employees, the Commissioner could essentially pick and choose which disputes to arbitrate.”