In a class action lawsuit filed Thursday, a fantasy sports contestant alleged that the cheating scandals that have recently engulfed Major League Baseball fatally compromised the fairness of fantasy contests promoted by the league. The complaint alleges that contestants would not “have wagered on fantasy baseball contests if they had known that the players’ performance statistics on which their wagers were based were not honest.”
While actively inducing their fans to enter into fantasy baseball wagers based on the individual statistical performance of MLB players, MLB’s member teams secretly engaged in corrupt and fraudulent conduct, in knowing and intentional violation of MLB’s Official Rules and regulations, that produced player statistics distorted by cheating and deprived their fans of an honest fantasy baseball competition. The corrupt conduct of at least two of those teams – the Houston Astros and the Boston Red Sox – has now been publicly exposed, revealing that, at the very least, all of DraftKings’ fantasy baseball contests from early in the 2017 baseball season through the end of the 2018 regular season and into the 2019 season, were tainted by cheating and compromised, at the expense of DraftKings’ contestants.
The complaint states causes of action based on unfair and deceptive practices in violation of various state consumer protection statutes, negligence, and unjust enrichment.
The case has been assigned to Judge Rakoff.