Question: Legal Interpretation

As I am want to do, ol’ FuwaFuwaUsagi was surfing the ‘net looking to get all educated up. That being stated, I came across a legal tidbit that I am having trouble digesting. I have broken this apart time and again and no matter what I do I come up with a couple of different reasons for the dismissal. I should point out I have no horse in this race, this is an item of pure academic interest. Normally I can read things and comprehend them, but this is on the fringe of my understanding. It is simply something I stumbled across and continues to puzzle me. This is the item that has me perplexed: +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ As to the Sherman Act claims, the franchisees defined the relevant product market for a rule of reason analysis as the market for approved products sold to GNC franchisees. The court found that the restrictions challenged by the franchisees were imposed by the franchise agreement; and in Queen City Pizza, Inc. v. Domino’s Pizza, Inc., 124 F.3d 430 (3d Cir. 1997), the Third Circuit held that a relevant market cannot be defined by such contractual restraints as a matter of law. The court distinguished the decision in Little Caesar Enterprises, Inc. v. Smith, 34 F.Supp. 2d 459 (E.D. Mich. 1998), because, unlike the GNC franchise agreement, the Little Caesar franchise agreement did not disclose the challenged restriction. The court thus dismissed the franchisees’ Sherman Act claims. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Reference: http://www.wiggin.com/db30/cgi-bin/pubs/ApplebyCurrents.pdf What I cannot divine is, did they say the court dismissed the claim because "a relevant market cannot be defined by such contractual restraints as a matter of law" and that is how the plaintiff defined their case, or is it because "the restrictions challenged by the franchisees were imposed by the franchise agreement", the later implying that: you signed the darn agreement, and the agreement readily trumps the Sherman Act. Opinions greatly appreciated. Sincerely, FuwaFuwaUsagi