ESPN and Major League Baseball have officially announced they will mutually part ways following the upcoming 2025 MLB season. In a letter obtained by The Athletic, MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred said that the league was not pleased with the “minimal coverage” that the league received on ESPN’s platforms over the past couple of years outside of live play by play coverage.
Manfred stated that MLB opted out of the contract that was set to expire following the end of the 2028 MLB season.
ESPN released a statement following the breaking news:
“We are grateful for our longstanding relationship with Major League Baseball and proud of how ESPN’s coverage super-serves fans,” said the network in a statement released Thursday night. “In making this decision, we applied the same discipline and fiscal responsibility that has built ESPN’s industry-leading live events portfolio as we continue to grow our audience across linear, digital and social platforms. As we have been throughout the process, we remain open to exploring new ways to serve MLB fans across our platforms beyond 2025.”
According to the letter obtained by The Athletic, the Commissioner stated that ESPN had engaged in an “aggressive effort” to reduce its $550 million/year broadcast rights fee. Manfred stated that ESPN used the league’s other agreements with Apple, Roku as rationale for the effort being that those agreements are significantly costly less than the one ESPN had in place.
Major League Baseball released a statement Thursday night that began as follows.
“We have had a long and mutually beneficial partnership with ESPN that dates back to its first MLB game in 1990. Unfortunately in recent years, we have seen ESPN scale back their baseball coverage and investment in a way that is not consistent with the sport’s appeal or performance on their platform. Given that MLB provides strong viewership, valuable demographics, and the exclusive right to cover unique events like the Home Run Derby, ESPN’s demand to reduce rights fees is simply unacceptable. As a result, we have mutually agreed to terminate our agreement.”
Manfred said that ESPN’s reasoning was “inapt” as the network has a fully exclusive window, while Apple and Roku compete with other games on other networks. Plus Manfred mentioned the exclusivity that ESPN has the Home Run Derby and Wild Card playoffs, where the other arrangements with other streaming platforms don’t have access to any of the content.
The Commissioner didn’t stop there according to the letter stating that the league does “not believe Pay TV, ESPN’s primary distribution platform, is the future of video distribution or the best platform for our content.” Manfred pointed to decreased subscriber figures for ESPN recently and states MLB did not think it benefitted the league “to accept a smaller deal to remain on a shrinking platform.”
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