A perfect match made in hell.

With MLB TV, there is no reason to turn on ESPN.

Al_Ed: How are the Red Sox doing, by the way? I don't really follow baseball...

To be honest, a lot more wrists would be slashed in response had you asked this just a couple days ago.

This is actually very bad news for baseball.

I was hoping that MLB would go back to an unbalanced schedule so that teams fighting for wildcard spots had the same strength of schedule. Currently, a team from the NLWest or ALWest has a much easier road to a wildcard spot than a team from the NLEast or ALEast due to the unbalanced schedule.

But, now that the Yankees/Red Sox/Go SEC!!! channel has extended their right to broadcast Yankees/Red Sox, there's no chance that MLB will go back to a schedule that has less of the important (i.e., Yankees/Red Sox) games.

FriarReb98: For the record, as a Red Sox fan, I hate that every series seems to be on a weekend, and then we get stuck with the Fox team farking up the Saturday game and a game that ends after midnight on Sunday. Can't we let teams that know how to get game done in under three hours take the Sunday Night slots??

I hate to agree with a Red Sox fan, but THIS.

As long as this doesn't affect the radio broadcasts of games, I can deal - the silver lining of the Fox/ESPN broadcasts is that I can mute the TV and listen to the radio.

/likes Sterling & Waldman
//shut up I know

Nana's Vibrator: I've watched plenty this year, but I've actually made it a point to watch the past few games, seeing as the management did seem to reach out and listen to the fans

Certainly; "Red Sox Nation" should be writing thank you letters to the Dodgers until season's end.

Now, whether or not you trust Cherington, Lucchino, and etc to act prudently with all this newly freed up money is a different discussion.

generalDisdain: WTF Indeed: With MLB TV, there is no reason to turn on ESPN.

Indeed. Do you watch through a browser, the app or Roku?

I watch through PS3 mostly, but will use the browser at work. Also if the game is nationally televised it is blacked out of MLB.TV which suck since I don't have cable

WTF Indeed: With MLB TV, there is no reason to turn on ESPN.

I'm right there with you. MLB TV is one of the greatest things ever. For a small nominal fee you can see any game you want, have a choice of boradcast crews doing the games, it's a great alternative to the humongous bucket of suck that is ESPNY's boradcast crews and there's the added bonus of all the different options you have for viewing (online, app, etc.).

4NTLRZ: I'm right there with you. MLB TV is one of the greatest things ever.

And the MLB Network has long rendered ESPN's Baseball Tonight horribly redundant and unnecessary. The only thing you really have to really put up with on the MLB Network is when Mitch Williams does that thing when his lips move and words come out, which sometimes is truly unfortunate to the viewing public.

Really? Really.

/Really

satanorsanta: I watch through PS3 mostly, but will use the browser at work. Also if the game is nationally televised it is blacked out of MLB.TV which suck since I don't have cable

It's a great service, but has a few little nits that keep it highly irritating at times. (And I'm not sure it's that helpful if the team you follow broadcasts a lot of their games locally, unless you're willing to time-shift -everything-.)

Biggest gripe: Blackouts of "nationally televised" games that AREN'T. I get that it's the fault of a poorly executed or lazily conceived contract or something, but why the hell can't I watch a game that isn't broadcast by anything in my area? Happens frequently when, say, the Giants are a "national" game for Fox, but my affiliates broadcast [NY | Bos, say] and/or a local game. Can't blame them for the decision, but at whom do I grind my teeth and mumble obscenities that I can't get the Giants over the air *or* on MLB.tv? MLB? Fox? Both?

Annoying!

Also annoying: With the national (re-)broadcast, you can only get the home-team radio signal (at least on PS3, and iirc). Leaving you with the choice of Joe Buck (or Buck clone) on national or the other team's home guys. Doesn't seem like it'd be that hard to have both radio feeds. But maybe I am wrong.

Still gonna give 'em my money, though. But if they ad unskippable ads to the PS3 stream, I may be looking for *cough* alternative *cough* sources.

No more Yanks vs Sox on ESPN, please!

/Yankees fan.

generalDisdain: You don't understand the blackout rules.
Example: FOX owns the rights to all games broadcast on Saturday at either the 1PM Eastern or 4PM Eastern slot.
Due to that contractual agreement, no games during that time slot will be available through MLB.tv.
Blackout rules related to location are determined by your IP secondary to any TV contracts.

Oh, I understand the blackout rules, thank you very much.

The blackout rules are simply stupid -- completely nonsensical, even.

Fox owns the rights to *multiple*games* at 1pm and 4pm.

Each local market will broadcast only a portion of those games (one, probably; two if you're lucky enough to receive broadcasts from two adjacent markets).

By definition, the rest of those games aren't "national broadcasts." There is no way for me to get them (legally / easily). Why should I have to wait for the game I am interested in to be over (+ ~90 minutes!) to watch it on MLB.tv, if I have no other way to watch it? It's not like I'm going to *have* to watch it OTA and see the ads otherwise.

All the blackout rules do, in these cases, really, is incent me to look into other ways of getting games. Seems both Fox and MLB are risking shooting themselves in the foot, to me. I know there are ways around it, but if I'm going to cheat, I might as well save the MLB.tv $$, too. And I don't want to cheat, anyway... and the PS3 interface is (reasonably) easy....

Somewhere, someone didn't think their cunning plan through all the way when they said, "yeah, here's a good idea - let's give national rights and protections to broadcasts that aren't shown nationally!" Stupid, and infuriating, and every time it happens (like the starting busy-indicator bases running *backwards*), I think to myself, "ya' know, there's probably a way to save the subscription costs and be less annoyed by myriad little and big things while doing so."

Friday night, an MLB Network special! The Sox travel to Yankee Stadium!
This Saturday on Fox, Sox@Yanks!
Sunday night on ESPN, the greatest rivalry in baseball!

I remember at least a couple of occasions where it went down like that.

Thank God for Tuvalu. I hardly ever miss a Reds or Giants game.

Zombie Hitler: No more Yanks vs Sox on ESPN, please!

/Yankees fan.

But it's the greatest rivalry on sports, because it's on tv all the time! As announced by the people putting it on tv all the time.

TheLopper: Zombie Hitler: No more Yanks vs Sox on ESPN, please!

/Yankees fan.

But it's the greatest rivalry on sports, because it's on tv all the time! As announced by the people putting it on tv all the time.

I'm at the point where I don't even watch the ESPN game. I'd rater listen to it on the radio.

SFSailor: Biggest gripe: Blackouts of "nationally televised" games that AREN'T. I get that it's the fault of a poorly executed or lazily conceived contract or something, but why the hell can't I watch a game that isn't broadcast by anything in my area? Happens frequently when, say, the Giants are a "national" game for Fox, but my affiliates broadcast [NY | Bos, say] and/or a local game. Can't blame them for the decision, but at whom do I grind my teeth and mumble obscenities that I can't get the Giants over the air *or* on MLB.tv? MLB? Fox? Both?

Just get yourself a proxy IP from another country, and reload your MLBtv and your'e good to go. At least, that's what I did from 2005-2007 when I was out of my home market. I'm assuming that still works because MLB ain't exactly on the cutting edge when it comes to their IT department.

But yeah, the blackout rules are complete and utter bullshiat, and it has led to most teams just playing night games on saturday night to avoid the blackout. It's completely destroyed weekend day-baseball, and that is a bad thing. Fark FOX, and fark MLB for selling us out. I want to watch my favorite team on saturday afternoons, not Joe Buck calling a Cardinals-Cubs game.

generalDisdain: SFSailor:

Biggest gripe: Blackouts of "nationally televised" games that AREN'T. I get that it's the fault of a poorly executed or lazily conceived contract or something, but why the hell can't I watch a game that isn't broadcast by anything in my area? Happens frequently when, say, the Giants are a "national" game for Fox, but my affiliates broadcast [NY | Bos, say] and/or a local game. Can't blame them for the decision, but at whom do I grind my teeth and mumble obscenities that I can't get the Giants over the air *or* on MLB.tv? MLB? Fox? Both?

You don't understand the blackout rules.
Example: FOX owns the rights to all games broadcast on Saturday at either the 1PM Eastern or 4PM Eastern slot.
Due to that contractual agreement, no games during that time slot will be available through MLB.tv.
Blackout rules related to location are determined by your IP secondary to any TV contracts.

How do you explain this one. A couple of years ago the Twins were playing the Royals on the last weekend of the season with a playoff spot on the line (for the Twins obviously). I'm a Twins fan living in Kansas and, for some reason FSN decided not to air one of the Royals' last regular season games (I can't remember if it was the Saturday or Sunday game). So the game wasn't being shown anywhere in Kansas and yet I was still blacked out of MLB.tv.

/Thankfully the PSN network outage happened right when I discovered how terrible the Twins were going to be last year and I was able to get my annual subscription canceled and refunded in May.

Actually, subby, one of the new contract stipulations is that ESPN has to show each team on television at least once per year. Granted, that probably means we're going to get Yankees/Royals, Red Sox/Orioles, and Dodgers/Rockies, but it's better than before.

people still watch baseball on TV? Isn't that just precious? I like watching it live, especially since my local minor league team has a couple of vendors serving good beer comparatively cheaply.

The_Great_Hambino: This is actually very bad news for baseball.

I was hoping that MLB would go back to an unbalanced schedule so that teams fighting for wildcard spots had the same strength of schedule. Currently, a team from the NLWest or ALWest has a much easier road to a wildcard spot than a team from the NLEast or ALEast due to the unbalanced schedule.

LOLWUT?

Chakro: Strasburg, what about Strasburg? All I ever hear on their XM-Sirius radio is Strasburg. It's all they ever farking talk about, it's more irritating the the Yankees-Red Sox crap.

The Strasburg thing is even more annoying if you're in a Nationals market area, as I am. While I am a fan of the Nats it gets tiresome when every local sports chucklehead is on the "should we be shutting Strasburg down to save his arm instead of going for the Series this year?" Non-debate kick ad infinitum, and then the nationally syndicated guys (who I usually relied on to break that up) are hammering the same story into the ground. It's why I'm so glad that Redskins cut Chris Cooley today, despite him being pretty much my favorite guy on the tam (not favorite player, favorite guy) so the local sportsyak drifted away from Strasburg.

Anything better then hearing Dewayne Staats screw up everything and announce the rays to win the world series. All season long, he clearly has no clue when it comes to baseball, long as the "rays" win they are #1.
I've heard some terribly bad announcers, but this guy takes the cake. Fox or ESPN doesn't come close to how bad this guy is.

I'm done hearing him murder stats of ball players, whether he takes them from a PREVIOUS season or simply has no knowledge or baseball - nothing is better then watching a ballplayers stats on screen then watching Dewayne
give you LAST years stats on hand.

/I laugh because I can see why he got fired from the new york yankees

The_Great_Hambino: This is actually very bad news for baseball.

I was hoping that MLB would go back to an unbalanced schedule so that teams fighting for wildcard spots had the same strength of schedule. Currently, a team from the NLWest or ALWest has a much easier road to a wildcard spot than a team from the NLEast or ALEast due to the unbalanced schedule.

But, now that the Yankees/Red Sox/Go SEC!!! channel has extended their right to broadcast Yankees/Red Sox, there's no chance that MLB will go back to a schedule that has less of the important (i.e., Yankees/Red Sox) games.

No, I don't see that happening. With six even divisions, I'm betting the schedule will look something like this:

- 18 games against each division opponent (72 total)
- 6 games (home-and-home) against each opponent in the other two divisions (60 total)
- 6 games (home-and-home) against one of the three divisions in the opposing league (30 total)

That's exactly 162 games, and is probably (save for a balanced schedule) the fairest way to do it.

DanZero: How many more commercials are they gonna show on their NASCAR coverage to pay for this?

Who cares, vroom vroom, turn left.

The_Great_Hambino: I was hoping that MLB would go back to an unbalanced schedule so that teams fighting for wildcard spots had the same strength of schedule. Currently, a team from the NLWest or ALWest has a much easier road to a wildcard spot than a team from the NLEast or ALEast due to the unbalanced schedule.

The ALWest is collectively 0.537. The ALEast is collectively 0.520.

Please explain?

Slow To Return: The_Great_Hambino: I was hoping that MLB would go back to an unbalanced schedule so that teams fighting for wildcard spots had the same strength of schedule. Currently, a team from the NLWest or ALWest has a much easier road to a wildcard spot than a team from the NLEast or ALEast due to the unbalanced schedule.

The ALWest is collectively 0.537. The ALEast is collectively 0.520.

Please explain?

East coast bias, plain and simple.

/espn finally realized there's some good baseball being played in Arlington.

I wonder what rights to highlights means.

hopefully that doesent mean ESPN would be the sole highlight provider to the world.

Sooner or later, someone will figure a way to watch whatever baseball game they want to without television entirely. Maybe over the internet or something.

That sure would be something, to never have to pay cable companies who in turn have to pay networks like ESPN, who in turn have to pay MLB (each taking a nice cut, of course).

I'd be willing to pay $10 to watch my choice of a live baseball game via internet. MLB should just sell that directly to consumers and screw television entirely.

Al_Ed: How are the Red Sox doing, by the way? I don't really follow baseball...

*snicker*

heeheeheehee

WTF Indeed: With MLB TV, there is no reason to turn on ESPN.

Wrong. At least when I had mlb.tv there were more games blacked out than showing. MLB.TV didn't show any games carried by espn or fox.

And of course, all games are blacked out in your local market.

That was a few years ago. It would nice to find out of that has changed.

Plus, ANYTHING is better than watching a game on fox with joe buck and tim mccarver. I have to mute the tv when those 2 idiots are calling the game.

I don't think I want to watch any more Red Sox games. If not for the Dodgers wanting to throw money around, the Sox would still be stuck with those players.

Slow To Return: The_Great_Hambino: I was hoping that MLB would go back to an unbalanced schedule so that teams fighting for wildcard spots had the same strength of schedule. Currently, a team from the NLWest or ALWest has a much easier road to a wildcard spot than a team from the NLEast or ALEast due to the unbalanced schedule.

The ALWest is collectively 0.537. The ALEast is collectively 0.520.

Please explain?


Admittedly, I wasn't really thinking about the AL divisions. The NL scenario is completely valid.

I was thinking about Seattle in the ALWest, and I completely forgot that the Red Sox are horrid this year. My bad.