Bally is toast

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Fan_In_NY
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Re: Bally is toast

Post by Fan_In_NY »

NDark wrote:
January 25 23, 6:35 pm
Please ESPN just buy it already. Get rid of the stupid blackouts and put the games on ESPN+ so there is a monthly fee that can be apportioned out to the teams so they stop this blackout madness.
MLB is going to eventually take all of the Bally's markets in-house, and then they will sell it to Apple or Amazon for the distribution.

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AdmiralKird
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Re: Bally is toast

Post by AdmiralKird »

Bally was moving towards offering a streaming-only service rather than requiring a cable package. I think they have (had) it for some teams? But the Cardinals hadn't entered into agreement for it.

AWvsCBsteeeerike3
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Re: Bally is toast

Post by AWvsCBsteeeerike3 »

Streaming already exists for every game. MLB owns the rights and area available with a purchase, I believe, but only outside the blackout areas, which are significant.

Aside from pirated streams, nothing exists for streaming inside the blackout restrictions unless it is from a cable company or a deal with streaming service (eg, youtubetv, fubu, etc) has been reached. And, even if those agreements exist, for people (like in Iowa) it is only going to be for one team, most likely. So, if you're in Iowa and blacked out from cubs, white sox, brewers, cardinals, etc, even if YouTubetv has a deal with Bally, the deal is only going to be for 1 of the teams from that list, from my understanding. This may be similar, and I believe is, to what cable companies have in place. In Little Rock, I can get Astros games but not Cardinals games. I've talked with youtubetv about this and there is nothing they can do, or so they say.

What they really need is a way for people to be able to pay for games of their choosing regardless of blackout areas. So people blacked out from Cardinals games that have cut the cord can purchase, from someone and presumably Ballys wants it to be Ballys, the right to watch the games either on their own app or MLB's app or ESPN's app or whatever while Ballys gets the, or some portion, of the income. I think that's the sticking point.

Ballys bought in with these blackouts which gives them undeniable leverage. But, due to the onerous nature of the blackouts, unreliable access from cable companies especially on the fringe areas, people have cut cords regardless of also losing any hope of access to their MLB team's games.

This is all well cataloged on here including many of my complaints about the issue stemming back to 2006 when I signed up for directv solely because the local cable company didn't carry the Cardinals in april and I could get Cardinals games through directvs mlb package, which I did. For a week. Then the local cable company bought the rights and directv lost the rights. So, I had signed up for a year of directv and bought the mlb package only for the rights to change one week after purchase. Which is such bull [expletive]. [expletive] MLB and their stupid restrictions.

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GeddyWrox
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Re: Bally is toast

Post by GeddyWrox »

I can't remember where I saw it. Probably STL Today?? But one of the DeWitts was asked about the blackout rules specifically and he indicated that he feels like there is momentum towards getting rid of them.

The sooner the better.

beehut
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Re: Bally is toast

Post by beehut »

Can ESPN buy it, with Disney being the majority owner of ESPN? I thought that was why Disney had to sell FSN to Sinclair in the first place when they acquired 21st Century Fox?

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NDark
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Re: Bally is toast

Post by NDark »

beehut wrote:
January 27 23, 10:21 am
Can ESPN buy it, with Disney being the majority owner of ESPN? I thought that was why Disney had to sell FSN to Sinclair in the first place when they acquired 21st Century Fox?
I think this is correct. I just mentioned them as an example but probably would be more like Apple or Amazon as someone else mentioned. I would gladly pay for Apple+ or whatever the hell it is called if I could get baseball but I am not about to sign up for cable or sattelite and then pay for a sports package on top of that.

I think Apple may be promising. They dipped their toes into it last year and they certainly have the money. Problem there is how would it be broadcast to cable subscribers. There will still be a significant amount of those. ESPN would be the only option for that. Who knows how it would happen but we need more options.

I hope this is the last straw for blackouts. With the downward trend in cable I think MLB is missing the boat like they so often do.

Fixing this issue will broaden their reach and bring people back.

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go birds
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Re: Bally is toast

Post by go birds »

i hate the idea of streaming sports in general so this sucks.

the feed is behind and there's a good chance of buffering--never fails. It's cool to have the access when on the go and watch on an iPad or something, but i'm usually trying to watch on my big screen at home and there's 100% chance the feed will be interrupted at some point.

first world problems i know, but the future of watching live sports is not looking good (see NFL Sunday ticket).

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ghostrunner
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Re: Bally is toast

Post by ghostrunner »

GeddyWrox wrote:
January 27 23, 10:04 am
I can't remember where I saw it. Probably STL Today?? But one of the DeWitts was asked about the blackout rules specifically and he indicated that he feels like there is momentum towards getting rid of them.

The sooner the better.
Yeah that's encouraging from an owner. It means they're finally losing money on it or finally convinced they're losing money.

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Re: Bally is toast

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Joe Shlabotnik
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Re: Bally is toast

Post by Joe Shlabotnik »

I'm having trouble following who's on what side. Ultimately will it be good the Cardinals / MLB become owners because they want to ditch the blackouts? That's what I'm inferring from this thread but I'm not sure I am getting it right.

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