The LIV Golf v. PGA Tour Antitrust Case as a Case Study in Federal Civil Procedure

This Article uses LIV Golf Inc. v. PGA Tour, Inc., a sophisticated and headline-grabbing antitrust matter, as a means of instantiating federal civil procedure concepts. The first Part of this Article addresses the unsuccessful motion for a temporary restraining order that in many ways shaped how the litigation proceeded. The second Part examines the dance that is discovery through a focus on a drawn-out dispute regarding a single interrogatory. The final Part drills down on a more novel discovery dispute that began the path towards settlement, namely whether the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 and related common-law doctrine insulated two third parties based in Saudi Arabia from discovery obligations in the United States.

The Article concludes that, although the settlement of the case was superficially a front-page surprise, it was actually the inevitable result of procedure. Created both to inspire assignments and be assignable, this is an Article written with the classroom in mind.