MLB Commissioner Bud Selig and most other MLB execs will not have to be deposed, at least for now, in the Dodgers bankruptcy case following a discovery ruling earlier today in favor of the league. The Dodgers and Owner Frank McCourt sought a wide variety of documents and depositions from MLB they believed would show a pattern of abuse and animus on the part of Selig. But Judge Kevin Gross of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware agreed with MLB that most of the discovery requests were not material to the question of debtor-in-possession financing currently at issue in the case.
"This clearly in my mind is not an appropriate occasion to turn this into a trial on the commissioner," Gross said. "On the issue of financing, the discovery seems to be not relevant." Gross, however, did acknowledge some of the broader issues the Dodgers are seeking to raise relative to Selig could arise at later points in the case. But should that be the case, MLB likely would have an opening to drill into what it views as mismanagement of the franchise by McCourt.
"Doesn't the commissioner have to then present evidence that their action and their attitude was in fact appropriate given mismanagement and doesn't that open the door relating to the issue of mismanagement?" Gross asked Dodgers attorney Bruce Bennett.
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The Dodgers, meanwhile, said this afternoon they still expect their preferred DIP financing from HighBridge Capital Management to be approved over MLB's alternate proposal. Gross will hold a July 20 hearing in Wilmington, Del., to rule on the interim financing.
"The denial today by the Court of the Dodgers' motion for expanded discovery of MLB changes nothing with respect to the superiority of the DIP financing secured by the Dodgers," the club's statement reads in part. "As the court indicated, there will be other opportunities in this bankruptcy case for the Dodgers to obtain the discovery that MLB does not want to share with the Dodgers and the Court."
Meanwhile, several anti-McCourt letters from individual fans imploring Gross to side with MLB were entered today into the formal case record.
