Sponsor sues Jaguars to have its name removed from 'clown game'

The Jacksonville Jaguars have suffered through an embarrassing season from start to finish in 2021. The campaign appears to be ending in appropriate fashion, with the franchise facing a very embarrassing lawsuit from a primary sponsor.

RoofClaim.com, a Georgia-based roofing company, is suing the Jaguars in a bid to disassociate the brand with the team’s final regular-season game. The company fears “irreparable harm” for being associated with the game, in which a group of fans plans to dress up as clowns to protest owner Shad Khan’s decision to retain GM Trent Baalke.

In a complaint filed Thursday in Jacksonville, RoofClaim.com stated that it wanted to avoid “its brand being emphasized as the primary sponsor of the clown game,” via Mark Long of the Associated Press. The claim, originally obtained by the Florida Times-Union, argues that the Jaguars “utterly failed to provide the sponsorship benefits outlined in the agreement” by creating a “toxic marketing environment.”

The Jaguars said the lawsuit was “baseless and without merit.”

Some Jaguars fans plan to participate in a “Klown Out” for Sunday’s game against the Indianapolis Colts to register their displeasure with the decision to keep Baalke as GM. While it is unclear how many fans will participate, there is clearly some fear that the number will be fairly high if a company is willing to go to court over this.

Beyond the fact that Baalke has few successful personnel moves to point to in Jacksonville, there are rumors he may be hindering the team’s head-coaching search. Now, fairly or not, his presence has led to the phrase “clown game” being attached to the team’s season finale in a legal filing. That has to be pretty embarrassing for Khan and the organization as a whole.