After being together for more than 30 years, the MLB game may no longer be aired on ESPN after this year.
According to a league memo from MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred, obtained by Athletics Evan Drelich, the league and the network “will mutually agree to end their agreement after the 2025 season.” The two parties had contracts until 2028, but they had a March 1 deadline to opt out of either.
The note says Manfred complains that MLB is “not satisfied with the minimum coverage MLB has received on ESPN’s platform over several years other than actual live game coverage.”
ESPN reportedly asked MLB to charge rights fees lower than the average value of $550 million on existing transactions. MLB declined, and reportedly said Manfred is expecting at least two potential options in the coming weeks.
The MLB then issued an official statement pointing out that ESPN is reducing baseball’s scope but not excluding returns.
“We have long and mutually beneficial partnerships with ESPN, which date back to the first MLB game in 1990. Unfortunately, in recent years, ESPN has reduced its baseball coverage and investment, and it doesn’t match the appeal of the sport. It’s expanding in ways. Or, given that MLB offers powerful audiences, valuable demographics, and exclusive rights to cover unique events like Homerun Derby, performance. As a result, We mutually agreed to end the agreement.
ESPN issued its own statement, saying it is still open to covering MLB and abandoning the term “SuperServe” in the process.
“We are grateful for our long-standing relationship with Major League Baseball and are proud of our coverage super-selves fans at ESPN. In making this decision, we have the same discipline and financial statements that have built ESPN’s industry-leading live event portfolio. Responsibility has been applied: growing audiences across linear, digital and social platforms.
The relationship between MLB and ESPN dates back to 1990. This is the period when Sunday Night Baseball became an iconic part of the league’s broadcast schedule. ESPN will also air Home Run Derby, various playoff games, “Baseball Tonight,” as well as a variety of playoff games.
The dissolution of this company is the latest move in the transition period for MLB broadcasting. Ten years ago, setting up a league television was easy. All teams had a regional sports network as the main financial engine. National broadcasts with FOX, ESPN and TBS and revenue from the league’s MLB.TV streaming platform lift all the boats. The main drawback was the local power outage.
The continued decline of cable network subscribers has dumped mathematics behind those transactions. Diamond Sports Group, which ran RSNS for more than 12 teams, went bankrupt and eliminated some of those transactions.
Meanwhile, MLB has reached deals with almost every streaming service that receives Manfred’s calls. Both Apple TV and Roku Channel are MLB, previously being mixed with Peacock and Amazon Prime has been involved in the New York Yankees game.
The league sees very clearly that it is streaming both the market as the future of its business. ESPN and its parent company, Disney, have their own streaming platform, but the deals currently being built were clearly not the way to do that.
