Fitz’ lawsuit will get him a big pay day. Agreed punishment, no new info, then he gets fired. Breach of contract and damaged reputation. $$$$$$
1) Breach of contract - Yes, there will be fight over the buyout in the contract (not sure the value). The walking back on agreed punishment does not impact anything on this underlying fact, only the information that led to firing matters.
2) No new info? A lot of new info came out since the initial suspension, which may bolster the evidence of "firing with cause" that NU may not have had before. This will ultimately determine the eventual settlement/court outcome.
3) Damaged reputation - Fitz will get $0 on this, unless the NU newspaper and other news agencies completely made up weekend stories. Fitz ruined his own reputation by either being blind to what was happening in his program or knowing of what was happening. Either way, that is on him alone. No payday here.
I very highly doubt that Fitz will get a large pay day. He will get something in a settlement (no way this thing goes to court), but it will likely be less than the buyout in his contract (the extent will depend on strength of evidence NU has). Both Northwestern and Fitz look terrible here, so no way they want to go to court.