Posted on 03/03/2020 11:22:02 PM PST by Mariner
One of the first stories I planned to do when I started this job exactly a year ago was on the state of the MLB.tv blackouts. I put out a call on Twitter for testimonials of frustration and received over 100 detailed emails.
They were lashing out against the absurdities of certain far-ranging and overlapping blackouts that leave pockets of the country unable to watch as many as six different teams on the app, sometimes despite having no actual option to watch those teams on local cable. Or else they were lamenting the more intrinsic, common issue of wanting to cut the cable cord while continuing to watch their hometown team. Alienating people who have that kind of fervent eagerness to engage with baseball — specifically by preventing them from doing so — seemed like the epitome of MLB’s oft short-sighted self-sabotage. It felt urgent.
Here’s what happened to that story: Someone at actual Major League Baseball suggested I just get YouTube TV in addition to my MLB.tv subscription. I did that and it solved my personal problems with accessing almost every game for all 30 baseball teams. And so I didn’t write that story in part because the solution seemed simple enough but more honestly because, pretty quickly, the idea of not being able to consume enough baseball content seemed very far away from my life.
(Excerpt) Read more at yahoo.com ...
As a cord-cutter I would gladly pay that to watch my team through the summer.
MLB hates the idea and is fighting to keep the byzantine market unchanged, as the market changes all around them.
The broadcast TV deals are very lucrative.
Their blackout policy is the dumbest. Unless you live 500 miles away from your team you can't stream them.
To make matters worse, you use to be able to get around it by using a VPN, but now they are cracking down and demand to use your device's GPS to determine your location.
Of course, whenever there is demand for something that is prohibited, someone will always come up with a way around it.
I shifted to radio only.
I am not going to subsidize the cable company who requires a “package” to watch my team. The package starts at $145/month.
Eff ‘em.
Someone sold them on the black-out idea being a ‘winner’. I just don’t see this working. Maybe with five or six teams....in highly urban areas, it might make sense (Dodgers and Angels for example). No one is going to pay money for this deal for a Padres or Pirates game.
” going to pay money for this deal for a Padres or Pirates game”
That is why MLB is adamantly opposed to teams streaming their own games.
Revenue sharing.
Some teams would get filthy rich (NY, LA, SF etc.) while Tor, SD and Pit would cease to exist.
Fans in Las Vegas, I am told, are considered in the “home market” for any California or Arizona team. That’s absurd. It means they are blacked out of games for the Padres, Dodgers, Angels, Giants, A’s and Diamondbacks and their only option is to get the cable system that offers their team (which I assure you is not the Padres or A’s). It has to do with the regional telecast licenses granted to Fox, NBC, Comcast or whichever RSN carries that team’s games. The pressure needs to be applied to the regional networks and their model that restricts cord-cutters.
That said, it's easy to stream games and bypass blackouts by using a VPN that allows one to spoof their location. (Everyone should use a VPN anyway.)
It is quite often during the season that I long for the days of turning on the boob tube to one of the “big 3” and catching a game. Free.
The game of the day is free, but rarely do the few times I track come on.
One or two years I subscribed to the post season, but the series was never shown live. MLB is run by a bunch of suits stuffed with shite.
What happened to broadcasting games with incessant commercials?
I read somewhere that you can watch games for free without blackouts at https://www.reddit.com/r/MLBStreams/
Streaming issues, blackouts...
And going woke.
That last one is what will end MLB.
I get all MLB games with the audio package; $20 for the entire season. That I can afford.
When O’Malley brought the Dodgers from Brooklyn to L.A. he decided not to make the “mistake” the NY teams had made of broadcasting every game. We got to see exactly 9 games a year on TV—the nine games played in SF against the Giants. If you wanted to actually see baseball, you had to go to the Coliseum.
Bigger problem for Spring games is corona paranoia.
It is ridiculous and it was the catalyst for me venturing into the VPN world to bypass their stupid restrictions.
MLB must think their primary customer has a private jet so they can show up anywhere in SoCal, NV and AZ at a moment’s notice. ;-)
They are locked into long-term contracts with regional sports networks. Gonna kind of toss a big legal kink into those plans.
Follow the money. I think that Sinclair paid too much for the Fox RSN Networks and are jacking up the prices as the carriage contracts expire. I’ve been caught twice: first with DISH and then YouTube TV (although a call from the governor postponed the execution). If YouTube TV negoitiations fail, the choices will be Cable, Hulu, and ATT TV. Two of these are very expensive.
One of the big problem is that sports broadcasting revenue model and the related contracts are based on the Cable TV households subscriptions in a given market. With people dropping Cable TV like it’s the coronavirus, the formula no longer works. Sinclair appears to be trying to make up the difference from the customer and others are trying to reduce the revenue that goes to the league and teams.
This fight is going to get ugly with the college teams and the small market professional teams probably ending up as the major losers. I will jump to Hulu if YouTube TV pulls the plug for the Fox Sports Kansas City channel goes away. But, that may be a short term solution. ATT TV requires a contract and the price doubles after the first year, so it’s a very poor solution. Not. Good.
Let them change. Stick a cork in it, MLB.
Steroid smoothies for everyone and dip the ball in superball gunk and let ‘er rip.
Why do you pay so much for stuff at the store? Could it be sponsors subsidizing ads for multimillionaire and billionaires in the ‘business’ of sports?
Even muh Twinkies are gaga for spending big dough.. (without stealing signs)
Just Win, Baby!!
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