A Livingston County man assaulted during a nationally televised confrontation with Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver DK Metcalf at Ford Field in December filed a $100 million defamation lawsuit Tuesday against the star and his team, along with prominent sports media figures and companies.
Ryan Kennedy, a longtime Lions season-ticket holder and mortgage company CEO, filed the suit in Wayne County Circuit Court after he was publicly labeled a racist following the assault. Metcalf claimed Kennedy called him the N-word, according to the suit.
He sued Metcalf, the Steelers, former NFL player Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson, Shay Shay Media LLC, All Time Sports LLC (which does business as The Volume), and Ford Field Management LLC.
The lawsuit stems from a Dec. 21 game between the Lions and Steelers in Detroit, where television cameras captured Metcalf reaching into the stands and grabbing Kennedy by the shirt collar during an exchange along the front row.
Kennedy alleges that Metcalf initiated the physical contact without provocation and that he never used any racial or misogynistic slurs during the encounter. According to the complaint, Kennedy says he referred to the player by his full name, “DeKaylin Zecharius Metcalf,” and only engaged in ordinary crowd jeering.
In the days after the game, Kennedy said he was falsely accused on a nationally distributed sports podcast of calling Metcalf the N-word and using a misogynistic slur to refer to Metcalf’s mother.
“The N-Word is the most offensive and inflammatory racial slur in the English language,” Kennedy’s attorney Jon Marko said Tuesday. “No other word expresses so much hatred and bigotry. Falsely accusing someone of using that word hurts not only the person falsely accused, but hurts every true victim of racial hatred and bigotry.”
The lawsuit centers on statements made by Johnson during a Dec. 22 episode of the “Nightcap” podcast, which is co-hosted by Shannon Sharpe and produced and distributed by Shay Shay Media and The Volume. In the broadcast, Johnson claimed that Kennedy used racial and misogynistic slurs and said he “heard it directly from DK,” according to the complaint.
The complaint further alleges that Sharpe amplified the claims during the episode by saying that “a lot of people have been killed behind words,” a remark Kennedy says fueled online harassment and threats directed at him.
The statements were then republished by major national outlets and spread widely across social media, where the allegations went viral and he was “publicly branded as a racist,” according to the suit.
The lawsuit names Yahoo Sports, ESPN, USA Today, Sports Illustrated, TMZ and other outlets as examples of media organizations that republished the claims while citing the podcast as the source, according to the lawsuit.
Kennedy alleges the accusations were false and made with actual malice or reckless disregard for the truth. He claims Metcalf was the original source of the allegations and provided false information to Johnson to justify the physical confrontation.
As a result, Kennedy says he received death threats, harassing voicemails, and hate mail, and that his mortgage-lending business suffered reputational and financial harm. The complaint includes a transcript of a threatening voicemail in which the caller refers to him as a “racist” and threatens his business.
In addition to the defamation claims, Kennedy is suing Metcalf for assault and battery, alleging the player intentionally reached into the stands, grabbed him by the collar, and pulled him toward the field during the game.
Kennedy also leveled allegations of negligence and premises-liability against Ford Field Management, alleging the stadium operator failed to properly monitor and secure the front-row seating area and allowed a player to access and physically confront a spectator.
The lawsuit further accuses the Pittsburgh Steelers of failing to supervise Metcalf and of being vicariously liable for his conduct, both for the physical incident and for the alleged dissemination of false statements afterward.
Kennedy is seeking more than $100 million in damages, as well as court-ordered public retractions and corrections from the defendants through the same channels where the statements were originally published.
The civil filing follows disciplinary action by the NFL. After the incident at Ford Field, the league suspended Metcalf for two games without pay for conduct detrimental to the NFL for initiating a physical confrontation with a fan. The league said players are prohibited from entering the stands or confronting spectators and may be disciplined for making unnecessary physical contact with fans.
Metcalf appealed the suspension. His coach, Mike Tomlin, said publicly that he spoke with the receiver about the incident but did not condone the behavior.
At the time of the suspension, Kennedy denied using any racial, misogynistic or hate-based language and said he had been subjected to harassment and threats after the claims circulated publicly.
Metcalf, who previously played for the Seattle Seahawks before being traded to Pittsburgh, has not yet publicly addressed the allegations in the lawsuit. None of the defendants named in the complaint had responded publicly to the filing as of Tuesday afternoon.