Steinbrenner Reps Dispute Suit Brought On By Former MSG Boss

A spokesperson for Yankees Chair George Steinbrenner said former MSG and MSG Network President Bob Gutkowski's $23M suit against Steinbrenner over the creation of YES Network contains "patently false and frivolous" allegations, according to Neil Best of NEWSDAY. Gutkowski Friday filed suit in Federal Court in Manhattan, alleging that it was his idea that Steinbrenner "launch a team-owned TV network, which eventually became YES, and that Steinbrenner failed to live up to repeated promises that Gutkowski would run the network." But Steinbrenner's spokesperson said Gutkowski had "nothing to do with the initiation of the idea for the New York Yankees nor did he have any role in the establishment or success of the YES Network." Gutkowski in a statement said that he "hoped to avoid a suit but that Steinbrenner's representatives sought to prevent him from speaking to the owner." Gutkowski: "Their actions made it very clear that the only way for me to be fairly compensated for the idea that I brought to George and the work that I performed was to sue him." He said that he filed the suit against Steinbrenner, rather than the Yankees, because Steinbrenner "made promises himself." Gutkowski's attorney Neal Brickman said that even if Steinbrenner is "unable to recall specifics, other witnesses to meetings involving the two can do so," including Yankees President Randy Levine and COO Lonn Trost (NEWSDAY, 8/29).

BROKEN PROMISES: Levine, speaking on behalf of Steinbrenner, said that he "would have no comment until he read the lawsuit." Gutkowski in his suit claims that he "met with Steinbrenner several times to discuss the Yankees' network idea," and later made a presentation to the organization that "laid out how to build a network." Gutkowski in the court filing said Steinbrenner promised Gutkowski would "be the one to build it and either run it or be significantly involved in it," and would be "compensated for his idea and efforts." Gutkowski alleges that he "never got the role or the compensation he said he was promised" (N.Y. TIMES, 8/29). Gutkowski indicated that he met with Steinbrenner in '96, six years before YES launched (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 8/29). In N.Y., Phil Mushnick writes what "many recall about the period prior to the 2002 launch of YES is that Gutkowski, who left MSG in 1994, seemed so much a part of the plan that it became a foregone conclusion he'd be appointed a YES executive, something that didn't happen" (N.Y. POST, 8/31).