Calling the Knicks’ lawsuit against them “baseless” and a “public relations stunt,” the Raptors have filed a motion to get it dismissed.
Toronto is seeking to get the case thrown out, saying it has no merit because of an “all-encompassing arbitration clause in the parties’ governing agreement,” according to court records filed with the United States District Court in the Southern District of New York.
The Raptors say the allegations are “false and overblown,” and were publicly available information any NBA team could obtain.
“In other words, they were far from confidential, let alone trade secrets. The Knicks surely knew this,” the Raptors said in the brief.
An MSG Sports spokesperson countered that the franchise is “confident” in its lawsuit.
“As we have previously stated, given the theft of proprietary and confidential files and clear violation of criminal and civil law, we were left no choice but to take this to federal court and are confident the judicial system will agree,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
The Knicks are suing former employee Ikechukwu Azotam for allegedly stealing proprietary information from the franchise.
The Raptors organization, parent company Maple Leaf Sports, Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic, player development coach Noah Lewis and 10 unnamed John Does are co-defendants in the case.
Azotam was hired by the Knicks in October of 2020 as an assistant video coordinator and left the team in August as a director of video, analytics and player development assistant.
The Knicks allege that Rajakovic, a rookie head coach, used Azotam’s experience with the Knicks to get him up to speed.
Included in the suit, the Knicks say that Azotam “began secretly forwarding proprietary information from his Knicks email account to his personal Gmail account, which he then shared with Raptors defendants,” at the time he was being recruited to join their organization.
The Raptors have insisted otherwise, and ripped apart the suit on Monday.
“The Knicks’ conduct from the outset of this dispute leaves no doubt that their goal has been to elicit negative press attention against the Named Defendants rather than the pursuit of valid claims,” the Raptors’ lawyer wrote.
On Raptors media day, team president Masai Ujiri addressed the lawsuit.
“There has been one time a team has sued a team in the NBA,” he said. “One time. Go figure.”