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Second Circuit Affirms Defunct Soccer League’s Antitrust Loss, Denies New Trial
06/09/2026On May 19, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit denied the now-defunct North American Soccer League’s bid for a new trial after a jury rejected its claims, concluding that plaintiff failed to prove a relevant antitrust market affected by the alleged conduct of defendants. North American Soccer League LLC v. U.S. Soccer Federation Inc., case number 25-1225. The Second Circuit affirmed the lower court’s judgment for Major League Soccer and the United States Soccer Federation. Plaintiff had accused the country’s premier soccer league and the sport’s governing body of rigging the league-sanctioning system to exclude it from the top tiers of U.S. men’s professional soccer. The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York denied plaintiff’s request for a new trial, and the appellate court affirmed both the denial of a new trial and an earlier decision partially granting defendants summary judgment on the grounds that league participation rules were not per se unlawful and, thus, required proof of a relevant market and competitive harm in that market.
Defendant governing body organizes U.S. and Canadian soccer leagues into Divisions I, II, and III in accordance with its Professional League Standards, which set minimum thresholds for number of teams and time zone reach. Leagues must reapply for designation in advance of each season of play. Defendant league has been the only Division I-sanctioned league since its first season in 1996. Plaintiff operated in Division II from 2011 to 2017, receiving waivers from Division II minimum standards in all but one year.
Between 2016 and 2017, defendant governing body denied separate applications by plaintiff for a new designation in Division I and, in 2017, for designation in Division II, leaving a different league as the sole Division II operation. Plaintiff filed suit.
According to plaintiff’s complaint, defendants conspired to weaponize the Professional League Standards as part of an anticompetitive scheme to insulate defendant league from competition in Division I and replace plaintiff in Division II.
Plaintiff brought claims against the governing body under Sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act for conspiracies to restrain trade and to monopolize the markets for top-tier and second-tier soccer. Initially, plaintiff sought a permanent injunction restoring its Division II designation and a preliminary injunction to maintain Division II status during the pendency of the litigation. The District Court denied the preliminary injunction, and the Second Circuit affirmed the decision.
Back in District Court, plaintiff amended its complaint, adding a new claim that the Professional League Standards were in and of themselves an unlawful agreement between defendant governing body and its members. The District Court dispatched this count in a partial grant of summary judgment but allowed the other claims to proceed to trial.
At trial, plaintiff offered four potential product markets: (i) Division I sanctions for men’s professional soccer leagues, (ii) team membership in a Division I men’s professional soccer league, (iii) Division II sanctions for men’s professional soccer leagues, and (iv) team membership in a Division II men’s professional soccer league.
The jury found plaintiff failed to prove the existence of any alleged market, and, per jury instructions, ended its analysis there. Plaintiff moved for a new trial, attacking the verdict form and jury instructions. Plaintiff argued it had no obligation to establish a market either for its Section 1 claims, because plaintiff alleged a per se violation, or its Section 2 claims, based on a theory that plaintiffs need only prove a “specific intent” to monopolize “any part” of interstate commerce. The District Court denied the motion, holding, first, that plaintiff waived these arguments by failing to contest the relevant market requirement. Second, the District Court held plaintiff’s legal arguments were without merit.
The Second Circuit agreed on both fronts, likewise finding the relevant-market argument waived and observing that plaintiff had endorsed the very jury instructions and verdict form it sought to challenge. On the merits, the Second Circuit explained that plaintiff failed to allege a per se Section 1 violation because the regulation of league sports can have procompetitive or competitively neutral effects and is therefore evaluated under the rule of reason, thus requiring proof of a relevant market. The Second Circuit noted that the same principle applied to plaintiff’s Section 2 claims, all requiring proof of a relevant market.
Because proof of a relevant market was an essential element of every claim, the jury’s relevant market finding rendered any error in granting partial summary judgment harmless and therefore unreviewable on appeal.
