The primary purpose of this article is to explore the 2012 legal decision that stemmed from an employment-related fiasco in 2007 when Coach Orlando Henry “Tubby” Smith first formed his staff at UM and asked coach Jimmy Williams from Oklahoma State University to join him as an assistant coach. Smith’s offer, however, proved not to be a legally binding offer, at least according to the Minnesota Supreme Court, because Smith apparently did not have the authority to make the offer in the first place. In fact, Jimmy Williams was declared by the Minnesota Supreme Court majority to have been sophisticated enough to know that such offers of employment need bureaucratic approval before being relied upon at this level of college sports. After reading this decision, one must ponder the implications of this sophisticated parties test in employment offers at least as posed now in Minnesota. A study of this decision, Williams v. Smith, provides an excellent example for instructors (and students) particularly in the context of contract law, tort law and employment law. After Smith was fired in 2013, the University of Minnesota hired thirty-year-old coach Richard Pitino, son of 2013 national champion University of Louisville basketball coach Rick Pitino, and included a clause in his contract that specifically who has the “hiring authority” which appears to attempt to avoid this situation again.