A California court has knocked down another NFL arbitration setup, ruling that a clause used by the Rams is unconscionable and therefore unenforceable.
On Wednesday, the Superior Court of California, County of Los Angeles rejected the Rams’ attempt to force Brittany Todd’s lawsuit into arbitration. Todd says she was fired on March 10, 2026 after raising concerns that her immediate supervisors were drinking on the job “to the point of extreme intoxication,” pressuring subordinate employees to drink, berating employees “to an abusive level” after becoming intoxicated, and mocking employees over their religious views.
At the center of the ruling was the Rams’ arbitration agreement, which gives the NFL Commissioner, or a designee, the exclusive authority to decide the case. That includes the first question of whether the dispute is “football-related.”
The court said putting that decision in the hands of an arbitrator employed by the NFL, the entity that represents the league’s 32 teams, made the agreement unconscionable.
The ruling marks the third recent decision to strike down NFL arbitration provisions. The Todd case is different from the Jon Gruden and Brian Flores matters, though, because the NFL itself was not a party in this lawsuit.
Todd’s attorney, Mike Caspino, praised the outcome.
“We are happy that our client will be able to have her day in court,” Caspino said in a statement provided to PFT. “We are also happy that all of the employees of the 49ers, Chargers and Rams will no longer be subjected to the NFL’s biased arbitration system.”
The decision adds more pressure to the league’s long-running attempt to keep disputes involving the NFL and its teams inside its own arbitration process.
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