Judge Joe Hardy sharply criticized Jon Gruden in court over discovery compliance in his lawsuit against the NFL, then ordered him to pay part of the league’s legal bills. The exchange came during a recent hearing that pushed a five-year-old case forward while also making plain that the judge no longer trusts what Gruden’s side is telling him.
Gruden is fighting to have his claims heard in open court after avoiding arbitration controlled by the NFL, and the dispute now centers on what the league is entitled to get through discovery. That fight surfaced in a blunt exchange over a BlackBerry device, the kind of small object that can matter in litigation because electronic records can preserve messages, contacts and other information that may show what was said, when it was said and by whom.
Michael McCann of Sportico obtained a transcript of the hearing, where Hardy asked, “So did your client lie to you about a BlackBerry?” Gruden’s lawyer, Adam Hosmer-Henner, replied, “It’s not a lie, Your Honor, it’s a mistake,” and said Gruden had told him he owned an old BlackBerry he could not turn on. Hardy pressed further, asking whether anyone from the office had checked whether there was an actual BlackBerry, and Hosmer-Henner answered that Gruden resides in Florida and that no one had been sent to rummage through his house.
The explanation did little to calm the court. Hosmer-Henner said Gruden flew back that night from an event at the White House so forensic examiners selected by the NFL could go through his electronic devices, but Hardy cut in and said, “So let me interject there, too, because if you can’t tell, this process is frustrating.” He then said, “We have no reason to trust representations by Mr. Gruden.” The judge also ordered Gruden to compensate the NFL for a portion of the attorneys’ fees tied to the effort to force compliance with the rules of civil procedure.
The ruling leaves Gruden in a familiar but worsening position: he won the right to fight the NFL in public court, but he is now doing so under a judge who has already criticized him in August for failing to comply with the rules. Hardy’s view matters because he will make many of the key decisions if the case reaches trial, and for now the unanswered question is not whether discovery will stay contested, but what else the NFL believes it still has not been given.
