MLB TV
There has never been a better time to be a sports fan. Sure we can all be turned off by the escalating salaries, the outrageous ticket prices, the $5 hot dogs, but the ability to sit and watch a game on any day of the week is great. Remember, it was not that long ago that sports was something that could only be seen on weekend afternoons, and on a five-minute highlights roundup on the 11pm news. Today through the wonder of cable TV, we can watch our favourite hockey team miss the playoffs with games in their entirety on a daily basis.
Now, through the wonder of the internet, we can now subscribe to streaming video of live games as they happen. I have recently subscribed to MLB.TV, a service of Major League Baseball that allows you to watch any out-of-market baseball game over the internet for $80 a year. So far, the service has been fabulous, the streaming quality with a high-speed internet connection is very impressive.
This may be a glimpse of the future of sports television delivery. Instead of subscribing to scheduled channels and sharing revenue with rights holders, a sports league could offer the games directly to consumers on this kind of pay-per-use model. Whether or not this is in the best interest of the league all depends on how much risk they want to assume that consumers will want to pay directly for the coverage. When teams sell their television rights to a broadcaster, the risk for generating an audience is then transferred to the broadcaster, and can be spread out amoungst all their holdings. For example, if baseball attracts a large audience, it can offset losses on basketball. If the league is selling directly to consumers, they had better hope that the audience will sustain the operation, as they can’t rely on that NASCAR revenue to pick them up when their audience is down.
But at the end of the day, I can watch any baseball game out there for a reasonable price. So the fan will win in the end.
