By Sachin Narayanan
The Philadelphia Phillies filed a complaint in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on March 14, 2025 against Zelus Analytics and Teamworks Innovations regarding the usage of their analytics software, the Titan Intelligence Platform. The Phillies sued for breach of contract, implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, promissory estoppel, and tortious interference with contract. The Phillies sought a temporary restraining order and an immediate injunction on the usage of the Titan platform by other non-contracted MLB teams. On the eve of a hearing, the Phillies voluntarily withdrew the case from the federal court on March 23 and refiled it in the state-level Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas. As an ongoing case, the outcome of this lawsuit carries significant implications for the ownership of statistical models created by third parties in the sports industry.
Professional baseball has pioneered the analytical revolution in team sports through the idea of ‘Moneyball,’ with the use of data and statistical models a key component in how the Oakland A’s constructed a record-breaking roster over a decade ago. With many leagues enforcing constraints such as salary caps and revenue-sharing policies to uphold competitive balance, the use of big data and predictive analytics has become the focal point for teams to gain a competitive advantage over their rivals. Front offices often employ entire departments comprised of data scientists, who are often supplemented by third-party analytics companies such as Zelus Analytics. They provide their proprietary predictive statistical models that use the data a team collects to provide actionable insights such as roster construction, talent scouting, and in-game strategic decision-making.
These analytics companies often have contracts at the league level, supplying the same service to all teams, or at least have tie-ups with multiple teams within the same league. However, a team purchasing such services might consider such multi-team deals as a loss of individual competitive advantage, due to which they try to sign exclusivity clauses, or sometimes even attempt to buy the entire company (Christian, 2023). Accordingly, such exclusivity could prove to be anticompetitive for the analytics company, which would be restricted from accessing the entire market of that sporting league. As such, this lawsuit raised by the Phillies against Zelus Analytics and Teamworks Intelligence will likely be a clash between competitive advantage and competitive freedom.
According to court documents, the Phillies-Zelus relationship began in 2022 with a one-year agreement that granted the Phillies divisional exclusivity for using the Titan Platform, with the defendants being barred from licensing their analytics suite to more than one team in every other MLB division (the six-team limit). This deal was renewed for a further two-year period until January 31st, 2025, with two key provisions (divisional exclusivity and six-team limit) remaining in place.
As described in the court filings, a problem arose in the subsequent renewal request by the Phillies, who wanted to maintain the two provisions. However, they allege that Zelus, in the meantime, had attempted to (i) unbundle Titan into multiple standalone products like Data Engine, Roster Intelligence, and Game Intelligence, (ii) offer it to teams beyond the six-team limit, and (iii) attempt to alter the scope of the exclusivity clause. Further, the Phillies alleged that they were granted exclusivity to the entire suite of analytical tools, including all the ‘elements’ or statistical models within the Platform, and so selling these individual elements as standalone products would undermine the value of the Platform as a whole. The Phillies also alleged that these actions have already caused and will continue to cause irreparable harm to the team by removing the competitive advantage they would have had through the two provisions and reducing the value of the investment in Titan.
Most of the Phillies’ arguments center around irreplaceable harm through a loss of competitive advantage, with claims that some damage has already occurred. However, there has not been any empirical evidence on the exact value or nature of damage, given the ambiguity in measuring competitive advantage from software exclusivity. Further, if the Phillies were concerned about the loss of exclusivity, it is questionable why they were willing to compromise with the defendants and permit them to at least monetize certain elements from the platform through a selective exclusion, for a discount. The other element is regarding what advantage the Phillies have derived from the platform so far. Had they used individual Titan elements for specific team operations, those departments would be impacted by other teams gaining access to those specific services. However, if the Titan platform provides additional value beyond the sum total value of its elements, for example, through an aggregated metric combining insights from the individual components, then there is still a unique advantage gained by owning the entire platform.
In this case, the key for the Phillies will be to prove that the irreplaceable harm (through loss of competitive advantage) is credible, not purely speculative, whereas the defendants could argue that the Phillies’ contractual demands are anticompetitive by establishing the uniqueness of the entire Titan suite over its standalone components. This case could set a precedent for the other five existing MLB clients of Zelus/Teamworks to react in a similar fashion. The evolution of this million-dollar industry elucidates the relevance of the abovementioned case in the U.S. sports analytics market. With data analytics companies often striking league-wide deals that involve the sharing of data and analytical tools, the competitive advantage will not simply be from having resources but knowing the appropriate usage.
Sachin Narayanan is a doctoral candidate at Florida State University. =
References
The Phillies v. Zelus Analytics, Inc. and Teamworks Innovations, Inc., 2:25-cv-01384, COMPLAINT against Teamworks Innovations Inc., Zelus Analytics Inc. (D. Phil, filed Mar. 14, 2025).
The Phillies v. Zelus Analytics, Inc. and Teamworks Innovations, Inc., 2:25-cv-01384, Ex. A, Letter dated 3.20.2025 by Teamworks Innovations Inc., Zelus Analytics Inc. (D. Phil, filed Mar. 20, 2025).
Jack Christian, Take me out to the data field: On Evan Drellich’s “winning fixes everything” Cleveland Review of Books (2023), https://www.clereviewofbooks.com/writing/evan-drellich-winning-fixes-everything (last visited May 22, 2025).