Silverman v. Major League Baseball Player Relations Committee (Silverman I)
United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
516 F. Supp. 588 (1981)
During tense negotiations over the free-agency compensation system, several club owners and Commissioner Kuhn publicly complained that rising player salaries had caused serious financial problems for some clubs, but the bargaining representative PRC (defendant) refused the Players Association's request for financial data to substantiate those claims and never itself claimed an inability to pay; the NLRB's General Counsel Silverman (plaintiff) sought an injunction based on an alleged bad-faith bargaining violation.
Whether public statements of financial distress made by an employer are statements of inability to pay requiring the employer to disclose its financial condition during bargaining.