If you had the MLB TV package, you would have been able to watch all Angels games live...Only if you did not live near Orange County, CA...Black out rules apply...Yes, MLB TV costs you extra money...Not part of your usual cable package...
I had free MLB TV package last year because I had Tmobile service...
But that’s exactly the problem. I’m a mild occasional baseball fan at best. Generally I need something “interesting” (whatever that means that day) to be happening. I can go multiple years without seeing a single game. And sometimes I’ll watch a bunch. I’m not buying any package.
But meanwhile this incredible thing was happening, literally a once a century event, a pitcher with a shot at the HR title, and also topping one of the major pitching stats. Where were the games? Why wasn’t MLB smart enough to say “screw the local contracts and MLB package, we need these games on one of the national contracts”? MLB is regularly worrying about declining ratings and attendance, but what are they doing about it? I compare them to the NFL, the NFL is really good at saying “this game is too cool for that contract, get it on a big one”. Even before they formalized the flex scheduling into contracts they still were willing to do that when it was the right idea (think about the Pats last game in the 16-0 season, they slid that from their network to broadcast). MLB should have done that. And yeah that probably would have meant the league wrote some checks to some TV network “we’re moving this game to ESPN, here’s some money” but it would grow the sport and pay them back. And they did this multiple seasons, Ohtani did all kinds of amazing things with the Angels but the team sucked so they didn’t get a lot of national telecasts. They got lucky he moved to the Dodgers.
And now they’re complaining ESPN doesn’t do enough promotional shows to push the MLB. But why should they? If they won’t get the games to show. Should they spend hours talking about all the amazing stuff Ohtani is doing and then finish the show saying “but you don’t live in Orange County you won’t get to watch him”? If they want ESPN to help them then they need to help ESPN help them. Make it easier for them to get “high value” games, the kind of games that drive sports talk shows.
Sorry it’s a pet peeve of mine. MLB is so poorly managed. Drives me nuts.