In a ruling that could push the release of Venu Sports to 2025 or later, U.S. District Judge Margaret M. Garnett on Friday granted FuboTV’s request for a preliminary injunction to stop Walt Disney, ESPN, Fox, Warner Brothers Discovery and Hulu from moving forward with their sports-centric streaming platform.

The defendants will appeal Garnett’s ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, the Venu consortium confirmed in an email. The ruling also does not end the case in the trial court. Fubo sued in April, and the litigation in the Southern District of New York could continue to play out in court for many months, if not years. Fubo’s shares rose 20% on the news, closing Friday up nearly 17% at $1.53 per share.

Venu Sports is expected to launch in the fall and cost $42.99 per month. It would be a stripped-down package of ESPN, Fox Sports, the SEC Network and other premium sports channels, as well as some mainstream channels like ABC, Fox and TNT that carry sports. While Venu Sports would offer a wide selection, it would not include NFL games broadcast on CBS, NBC, Amazon Prime or Netflix, nor would it include games from regional sports networks.

The ruling was good news for others in the industry, including DirecTV, which supported Fubo’s motion in court. “We are pleased with the court’s decision and believe it adequately recognizes the potential harm that comes from allowing major programming providers to license their content to an affiliated distributor on more favorable terms than if they license their content to third parties,” DirecTV spokesman Jon Greer said in an email.

Venu’s stakeholders said their product offers consumers more choice and they would succeed in court. “We disagree with the court’s ruling and are appealing. We believe Fubo’s arguments are incorrect as to the facts and law and that Fubo failed to prove it is legally entitled to an injunction,” an ESPN representative said in an email. “Venu Sports is a pro-competitive option that aims to increase consumer choice by reaching a segment of viewers currently not served by existing subscription options.”

By granting Fubo’s motion, Garnett has put Venu Sports on the back burner for the foreseeable future. Barring a successful appeal, an early resolution of the case, or an out-of-court settlement, the injunction will remain in effect at least until a trial, which likely won’t take place until 2025 or later. It’s possible that the companies behind Venu Sports will see the wait as inconsistent with their business goals and abandon the platform altogether.

Fubo overcame difficult hurdles in convincing Garnett to grant Venu Sports a preliminary injunction. Preliminary injunctions are extraordinary and drastic remedies and require, among other things, proof of a substantial likelihood of success and that the company would suffer irreparable harm without a preliminary injunction. Preliminary injunction hearings also occur at the outset of litigation, before opposing parties are forced to fully present all relevant evidence and testimony.

Fubo built its argument on portraying Venu Sports as a Trojan horse. Under the guise of offering sports fans something new and seemingly dynamic, a group of competitors (i.e. Disney, Fox and Warner Brothers) conspired to monopolize its live sports content. They did this to increase their respective profits and eliminate potential competitors.

The release of Venu Sports, Fubo Garnett further warned, could bankrupt the company and cause sports fans to have fewer choices and pay more for content. Fubo also complained that the defendants do not allow streamers to offer their own stripped-down sports packages. Instead, they force streamers to bundle sports channels with entertainment channels and other bloated content that sports fans don’t want.

In her ruling, Garnett wrote that a 1981 decision (USA vs Columbia Pictures), in which film producers tried to create a cable channel that would have exclusive access to new films, “presents a scenario strikingly similar to this case.” In the Columbia Pictures case, a court blocked the film producers’ plan on the grounds that their channel would limit consumer options and make it difficult for HBO, Showtime and other cable channels to compete. Garnett said Columbia Pictures was accurate because it occurred ‘at a comparable time of rapid change in the television and film industry’ and involved a joint venture between rival companies to limit the nature of competition.

One difference between the two cases that did not convince Garnett was Columbia Pictures The case involved movies that would have been exclusive to the new channel, while Venu Sports would not offer exclusive content. Garnett also did not seem to trust the defendants, writing at one point: “Even if (they) swear that such price increases and exclusions will not actually occur… one purpose of antitrust injunctions is to prevent anticompetitive incentives from arising in the first place, so that American consumers are not left to simply take their word for it and hope for the best.”

The defendants tried to convince Garnett by pointing out flaws in Fubo’s theory. They emphasized that the content shown on Venu Sports was not exclusive to the streaming service and that each of Venu Sports’ backers would continue to license sports content individually – and thus would continue to compete with each other. Sports fans can acquire ESPN in a variety of ways, for example, and next year ESPN will also launch its own streaming service, Flagship.

Venu Sports would also not include sports content from other competitors such as Peacock, NBCU, CBS, Paramount+, Apple TV+, or RSNs. As the defendants put it, Venu Sports would be additive and pro-competitive because it would give fans choices they don’t currently have and not take away existing choices.

As for Fubo’s complaint that it was denied the opportunity to offer a stripped-down sports package, the defendants insisted that it was legally irrelevant, citing U.S. Supreme Court precedents that show there is no duty under antitrust law to compel companies to negotiate with competitors or to offer them a particular price or service.

On appeal, the Second Circuit would review Garnett’s decision to grant Fubo a preliminary injunction under the abuse of discretion principle. The judge’s decision would be upheld as long as it was within a range of permissible decisions. Defendants would argue that Garnett made a legal error, such as applying the wrong principle, misapplying the correct principle, or distorting the findings of fact.

–With support from Kurt Badenhausen.

(This story has been updated throughout with additional quotes and details.)