Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
Moderators: dirtonly  /  dmantx  /  hosehead

Sides admits to breaking the contract in his own words....kinda make the legal case for WRG..wish he would have signed the gold contract he was offered

I just listened to the interview... thank you for sharing!

Several people, myself included, have stated that the WRG probably has the "upper hand"! They will most likely win a court contest, due to a "technicality"...

With that said, the WRG's reaction is both arrogant and "over the top"!

Jason's Fargo trip didn't injure the WRG or their race event promotions. Jason is an asset, not a liability.

Unfortunately, instead of giving Jason a slap on the wrist, the WRG has actually attacked Jason. They seem hell bent on twisting this into a fiasco, instead of trying to find some common ground with a racer who has made a sincere effort to follow and support their premiere race series.

The whole situation is very, very unfortunate. WRG, I am not impressed! Your handling of this situation says a lot about your character.

Never hit stationary objects!

After listening to both Brian Carter on Winged Nation and Jason Sides on Dirtcast, I've come to the following conclusion.

Jason asked, but did not receive permission to run the Fargo race, essentially breaking his contract.

He was offered a new contract to be a Gold member instead of a Platinum member and he declined, essentially ending his contract with WRG (meaning, since he broke the original contract, the WRG no longer has to adhere to it either, ie: pay out point $$). Sounds like if he would have signed it, he would have gotten some tow $$ (not all that Platinum members get) and been elgible to recieve at least 12th place point $$. By not signing, he doesn't receive any.

Brian Carter seems like a smart businessman and even though I am not privy to their contracts with drivers and teams, he did state that Donny Schatz negotiated being able to run @ Fargo into his Platinum agreement prior to the season, therefore Donny was free to drive there at any time when a WoO race was not booked on the same night.

As far as the "asking for permission" part of this whole equation. Think of it this way. Do you have to go the CEO of the company you work for to ask for permission for a day off or for a leave of absence? No, you ask the superior in your department. In this case, it sounds like according to all involved (Jason and Brian Carter) that Carlton Reimers was that designee. Basically, Carlton said "No", as Jason basically admitted that he didn't even ask him for permission. You can't receive permission to do something when you don't ask.

For the record, I think losing Jason Sides from the WoO is the WoO's loss, not the other way around. But, the FANS may be the overall winner as Jason is now free to run where and when he wants as he is not legally bound by any contract.

I agree with most of what you said. However, I don't think Jason will run everywhere. Why? Because he won't be getting any tow money from the WoO. That's why not being a platinum member can really hurt. He should be a Gold member next year. Then he can basically do both. If the WoO would get their 90 races back, then the guys wouldn't have to run anywhere else!

Unfortunately (or fortunately) none of you know what happened. That's what juries are for....to determine who is telling the truth and who ain't. Juries do a GREAT job of that. Witnesses' reputations for truthfulness and honesty are admissible. Other instances where they might have lied are admissible....lots of cool Perry Mason stuff, I hear. Should be fun.

I want to mention again, though, one of the more important aspects to this saga: the Bill Rose aspect. It has now been confirmed that WRG was going to take the Rookie of the Year award from Cody Darrah for missing the Antioch show, and give it to Bill. WRG even had Bill's name on the trophy. I am told that Bill, to his incredible credit, refused the award, insisting that it should rightly go to Cody. As I said once before, that is not just an act of decency, but almost unheard of these days. Way to go Bill. (You're too old (mature) to get a Rookie award anyway Others should take a lesson from Mr. Rose. I can't wait to tell my kids what he did......

After listening to both Brian Carter on Winged Nation and Jason Sides on Dirtcar, I've come to the following conclusion.

Jason is honest, and tried to contact to get permission to race fargo, only to be ignored and WRG does have a legal obligation to get back with him and failed numourous times. Contract or no contract, Jason had all good intentions of getting permission and was ignored. Brian Carter admitted this! He tried passing the buck off on the guy named Carlton.

Brian Carter seems sneaky and very unreliable at his best. What he does best is powder coating his business to make it sound better than what it is. He does this to reel sponsers in. He lies, cheats, and has taken something that doesn't belong to him and that's Sides money!

My opinion only, WHY, would Sides sign a gold contract? He was a platinum member! Tony Stewart, Donny Schatz, Kasey Kahne, Cody Darrah wasn't asked to sign one!

So he admitted he didn't get along with the guy named Carlton, so he by passed Carlton and called Carter. Instead of Carter saying I'm busy crunching numbers I'll get back to you why didn't he say Jason I don't do that you need to call Carlton, or better yet, as a CEO, why didn't he say Carlton, Sides called you need to get back to him and give him a answer. Brian Carter knew what he was doing. My bet and once again just an opinion, after crunching numbers and seeing how bad it looked on paper this guy had to come up with some money and bells went off in his head. Looked what he and the company did in the other series. They found a guy cheating, Dq'd him.Instead of paying $50,000 to the second place team, the fined the cheater $25,000 and kept the other $25,000. So you take Sides $40,000 and the other guys $25,000 , hell, thats $65,000, just on two rip offs. I'm no attorney, I'm just a common guy that can see right through you Brian Carter.

It's just going to take one decent jury member, a racefan, a person who has been cheated, heck it'ts just going to take the truth. The only one telling the truth is Jason Sides. The other guy could't tell the truth if it smacked him in the face. He lost his credibility years ago!

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Add another $15000 plus of Cody's money and you have a big deal $80000.00. Cody even brought them out on the carpet when he was awarded the rookie and stated that they were giving it to Rose but he refused it and wanted everyone there to know what kind of man Bill Rose was.

I listened to Dave's interview of Jason and got a couple things out of it. I guess first of all he never got permission so in the final analysis I think that's going to work against him. No judge or jury is going to consider what the rabid hard core race chasers on Hosehead's message board think of Jason Sides or WRG, they'll just look at the breach of contract.

Regarding driver's complaints that the Outlaws need to get back up to 90 shows, that is out of the hands of the WRG. If the promoters can afford to book an Outlaw show at their track and make money they'll do it. I think what you're seeing here, and this is obvious when one tunes into a NASCAR race and a lot of NFL games that were traditionally sellouts is the effects of the economy on the paying customer, the fan. If promoters are worried about putting enough people in the stands some of them are going to hesitate to book Outlaw shows.

I think WRG and a lot of promoters and sports organizations are taking an undeserved bad wrap on account of it being tough times. Tracks drop their dates, it's the fault of WRG or SLS or whoever the bad guys of the week happen to be. If car counts are soft it's the fault of the tracks, promoters, WRG, or whoever the bad guys of the week are. It's kind of one of those situations where it seems like people can't see the forest through the trees. In a better economy six guys would be lined up to take Sides place on the tour and the fans wouldn't have paid much attention.

I think people need to take a closer look at the effect the economy is having on the sport and by extension on our dispositions. This whole deal is bad for the sport of Sprint Car racing and I think that it's too bad it can't be resolved behind closed doors between the parties involved. Dave asked Sides what he would do if he couldn't run with the WoO and he didn't have an answer. There are a bunch of drivers around who used to run with the Outlaws who are scratching and scraping trying to get and keep rides and run enough races to make a living. Haudenschild, Lasoski, McCarl, Tatnell, and the list goes on. Ten years ago the car owners would have been knocking their doors down or sponsors would have been helping them run their own deals. I think the hot beds of racing will do alright but I'm concerned about these out of the way markets and places that only run 360's being able to fill the fields. I predict that the WoO is going to depend on that outside support more then ever in the coming years. As far as somebody waiting in the wings to start a series, it has been tried twice and didn't succeed.

Stan Meissner

Why in the f*** would a sprint car driver need to sign a contract? What is the difference in the platium and gold memberships?

for the money...travel money-pit passes-ect and the contengency money at the end of the year...without it you race for what you can win - on you own dime

I'm not a judge or jury but the way i look at it if attempts where made to get the ok and the failure of the WRG to give him an answer in a reasonable amount of time is a breach of any contract also.. The 2nd thing is was this a reasonable fine for the first offense and has this been handed down before.. I didnt here where he said directly that he broke the contract i heard he made attempts and no one repsonded so he raced...On both sides of the contract each party has a duty that they must uphold. You cannot pick and choice who you fine and who you dont there are guidlines you must follow..To say yo dont go to a CEO to ask permisson in this case yes you can. I have 86 employees and yes some of them still call me and if i dont have time i call someone on my team to handle it thats just the way it works... just my opion take it how you want.

Hey WRG, we make things difficult and complicated for ourselves when we deceive others. Lies cost a lot to maintain, the truth is free.

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I really like Sides. But he's wrong on this deal. If Carlton says no most of the time, so he skips him and goes to Carter, and Carter doesn't get back to him, then no would have been the assumption. Is it a bad deal? You bet. But it sounds like the WoO tried to give him Gold status and he didn't except. It's too bad...but Jason did this to himself. I hope they can get together and get some money to him, but then again, a deal is a deal.

Woohoo...you are wrong.

He signed a contract, he signed a contract, he signed a contract, bla, bla, bla... Neither the words on the paper or the ink of his signature will matter nearly as much as the actions of both parties/

Contracts are neither gospel or a one way street. The contractor has just as much obligation as the contractee if not more. No contract gives anyone the right to take advantage of other party or be the judge and jury in a dispute. All contracts require both sides to act in good faith. Sides team should only need to argue that WRG used two different sets of rules in enforcing their platinum contracts and that they breached contract first by not responding in a timely fashion to his repeated requests to race and they didn't act in good faith either before or after the event. If they can prove that, nothing else should matter.

On the back of probably every ticket you purchase for a race is a phrase stating that with your purchase you contractually waive your right to sue and agree to hold harmless the track, promoter, etc from all responsibility for your risk in attending...bla, bla, bla, in the event you are are injured or even die due to flying debris...bla, bla, bla.

Yeah right. If something flew into the stands and severly injured or killed you or a loved one most would pursue some sort of civil suit. Claiming track was negligent with fence height, or team was negligent by not tethering part, etc, etc. And guess what... the tracks/promoters know it, which is why they all have significant insurance policies to protect them against such instances.

Most contracts are worth more as toilet paper than they are in determing who is right or wrong. WRG's actions, conflicting actions, and lack of action, will be the determining factors, not what Sides did without "permission".

I've been watching the Sides' debate rage on by the "master-debaters" here and on other racefan forums and here's my take on the whole deal (for what it's worth = about $.02) ...

Sides signed the normal contract for drivers and teams wishing to participate with the WoO Sprint Series full-time in 2011. That contract (as has been the norm for MANY years) states that you cannot run a non-WoO sanctioned race WITHOUT PERMISSION at ANY track. Sides apparently asked the series' head (Carlton Riemers) for said permission and was told he could not do so .... soooo he tried to go over Carlton's head and called and messaged Brian Carter (CEO - and despite what many apparently think is one HELLUVA nice guy and is a RACER at HEART, and I have spent time, very interesting and quite pleasurable time, talking with him at the Knox Nats and he has raced a midget at the Chili Bowl the past few years at his own expense) to try again to get permission to run the race in question. Understandably (at least to me) Brian was busy with the day-to-day business of being a CEO and CFO of a business and did not get back to his 'contracted employee' in a timely fashion. Should that 'contracted employee' or 'independent contractor' think that was a sign of acceptance of his desire to operate outside the bounds of his contract? I don't think so...

I'd imagine that Steve Kinser, Jason Meyers, Craig Dollansky and even Bill Rose would have loved to race and make some money that night as much as Sides did... whatthehell - they were in the area too... but they DID NOT because they were UNDER CONTRACT not to run WITHOUT permission.

I'm very, and terribly sorry that this situation has come to be such a divisive kindling-point for Sprint Car race fans ... but the fact remains that despite his efforts -- Sides did NOT get permission to run the race - yet he did it anyway.

The WoO's contract clause is like many ... yes - CORPORATE clauses in contracts that protects their "product" and "brand" from being siphoned away by others at a discount. Like it or not - that's the way business is done in this corporate day and age.... and it's understandable (at least to me)... For instance - why would or should baseball fans pay to watch Albert Pujols play with the Cardinals at Busch Stadium if they could watch him play for free at the local YMCA ballfield... (and YES - I know that's a VERY EXTREME and 'apples to oranges' example....) but = 'nuff said...

Phil Taylor

home-theater-systems-advice.com

Unfortunantly you are wrong there,sides never asked Carlton at all for permission to run that race.

He actually says in the interview everytime he would ask Carlton about anything,he would always reply with "let me ring the higher ups & ask".

So he said " INSTEAD of asking Carlton for permission to run that race,he took it upon himself to skip Carlton & got straight to the higher up that makes those decisions"

Its amazing how people only hear what they WANT to hear!

And as for those other drivers you mention there, Dollansky went & raced at Burlington this year,& Rose raced quite a few USAC races as well.

i have been a fan of Jason Sides since his ASCS days. He is fun to watch, great with fans, and a very loyal racer. i think its a shame what the WoO did to him after his years of support to them. very sad!!! what can the fans who support Jason do about it? well, this fan will not attend my normal WoO races next year. instead, i will attend a race Jason Sides is at and give him the cash that i would normally spend going to my normal WoO races. Congrats Brian Carter!!! You screwed a great person, and lost a loyal customer. Im sure their are more out there like me........