Major League Baseball (MLB) is scrambling to reassign a portion of its national live broadcast rights after ESPN terminated its agreement covering Sunday Night Baseball, the Home Run Derby, and the wild-card playoff round.
According to Puck’s John Ourand last week, MLB has initiated “early” discussions with potential partners such as NBCUniversal, Netflix, and Amazon. However, he emphasized that these negotiations are primarily geared toward 2028, when all of MLB’s national rights will be up for grabs, rather than solely addressing the package ESPN abandoned.
A source speaking to Front Office Sports revealed that NBC finds the prospect of adding MLB “intriguing,” partly because it could secure a high-profile live sports event for Sunday nights throughout the year. Following the resounding success of Sunday Night Football, NBC intends to slot major NBA games into that time frame after the football season ends, with baseball potentially filling the rest of the calendar. Still, another source raised a critical concern: “At what cost?”
ESPN had been set to pay $550 million annually through 2028, but The Wall Street Journal reported that the network was unwilling to exceed $200 million per year. In 2023, ESPN’s Sunday night package averaged 1.51 million viewers over the season, marking its best ratings since 2019.
It’s widely noted that MLB’s existing rights deals—Apple’s $85 million for Friday night games and Roku’s $10 million for a Sunday package—caused friction with ESPN.
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