Today in U.S. District Court, for the Southern District of New York, Anheuser-Busch InBev filed a lawsuit asking for a declaratory judgment against Major League Baseball. In “Anheuser-Busch, Inc. v. Major League Baseball Properties, Inc.,” ABI alleges that MLB “reneged on a renewal of its beer sponsorship rights this year and demanded ‘exponentially higher’ fees.” Back in April of this year, ABI believed it had reached a deal to renew its long-standing status (over 30 years) as the “official beer of baseball,” but apparently the baseball league tried to renegotiate the deal “due to ‘a change in marketplace dynamics,’ according to the lawsuit.” Naturally, MLB was seeking to increase the amount of money they would receive from ABI and also wanted to negotiate with rival beer companies for the same rights. The lawsuit asks the court to enforce the April deal and further prevent “MLBP from negotiating with any other brewers for sponsorship rights. The lawsuit doesn’t request money damages.” Baseball’s position is that the April deal was not binding and that they could “offer sponsorship rights to Anheuser[-Busch]’s competitors.” In addition to sponsoring the league as a whole, Anheuser-Busch also sponsors 26 of the total of thirty individual baseball teams in MLB.

The story has already been picked up by Bloomberg, Reuters, the St. Louis Business Journal and the Wall Street Journal.