tested said:
MLB still hasn't fixed their TV and money problems. MLB needs to take a page from the NFL and 1 - get a real salary cap and 2 - sell the rights to all the games at the league level, not team by team. All the teams need to share equally in the TV revenue. The Yankees and others will fight this tooth and nail, but ultimately I think they would find a huge benefit to having a more competitive landscape.
ALL the games? Not gonna happen, and not just because of the damn Yankees. Baseball, unlike football, has a game every single day, and no network is going to pay for that much. (This may have been based on a misinterpretation of what you're saying, but it hints at the problem with this.) You may be on to something though... read on.
The Baseball Network concept they had in the early 90s was a move in the right direction, but they didn't take it nearly far enough. TBN was the producer of the games and sold the broadcast rights to NBC and ABC. I'm not sure I'd have MLB "produce" every game, but I would have them sell the rights to every game.
MLB should sell a national broadcast package that includes a game of the week, the All-Star Game, Divisional Playoffs (depending on whether or not they want these games) , LCS and World Series. They could split this package or sell it all to one network.
Then they should sell a national cable package that includes a game (or games) of the week, playoff tie-breakers, Divisional Playoffs and maybe an LCS. (if the broadcast networks didn't want both LCS)
At the local level, MLB should offer a broadcast package and regional cable package to allow for all games to be seen in the home market of each team. The broadcast portion could be offered to other markets in the region with a good fan base or history of broadcasting the team's games over the air. (for example, I think stations as far away as Amarillo and Lubbock have offered Texas Rangers games in the past)
The key point is to have all the money generated from all these television deals going back to MLB for equal distribution to each team. This wouldn't preclude team owned cable networks from buying a bunch of games if they want. They'd still benefit from having the cable channels because they would get revenue from advertising that other teams don't.
The later part shows you're not completely disconnected from reality. However, not only will folks like the Yankees not like it, they will have a very compelling argument. Why should teams in the NL the Yankees don't even play see revenue from Yankees broadcasts on YES network, which won't be seen anywhere else but YES-land, and which will never involve those other teams? (Speaking of which, it looks like your plan could kill team-run networks. At the least they could have to compete on the open market for the games of the team that owns them, at the most they could be effectively outlawed.)
I do like the football comparison, but I doubt it's going to happen right now, unless we bring in the CW, for reasons mentioned earlier in this thread. In my perfect baseball national broadcast environment, two networks get baseball rights. Fox is the only truly free network, because their sports division is still relatively miniscule. Imagine my surprise one weekend to see the f'in Tour de France on CBS. Fox literally has had, at most, about four sports at once (NFL/NASCAR/MLB/NHL). The other networks can have four sports for just half the year.
On the other hand, the only obstacles ABC would have on Sunday is the NBA and NASCAR. A month into baseball season, the NBA playoffs start, and games can be shafted to ESPN and TNT. NASCAR can be stuck on Saturday, prime time, or ESPN. CBS and NBC will have golf interruptions. ABC, if I recall correctly, will only have the British Open. Of course, on Sunday, Fox is screwed when football season starts. Of course, it's also their turn to get robbed in the next NFL agreement. Of course, the likely candidate to do that is ABC, unless the CW has a bigger shocker than when Fox first got the NFL in '95.
So for the purposes of this discussion, we'll say the two networks involved will be Fox and the CW, on Saturdays. Probably wouldn't be, but hey. Fox would get all the National League games, and CW all the American League games. This actually works better for baseball than for football, since teams play only teams within the league except for certain Interleague series, and probably the only reason we haven't had it is because the "merger" of the leagues occured a lot earlier than in football. (Probably around the time of the Black Sox scandal, when Landis became the first commissioner.) ESPN would then keep all the games they have now. Either they or ABC would then add a Saturday night game. I've long thought Saturday primetime was a good time to show sports, since the networks seem to have a low opinion of both but sports will get ratings anywhere, so I'm a little psyched about ABC's new college football game on Saturday nights. I tell you, they will kick ass so much the other three "Big Four" will clamor for their own Saturday night sports. Even Fox.
Each network would then show their respective league's LCS and alternate coverage of the World Series - say, Fox in odd-numbered years and CW in even-numbered years. ESPN would get tiebreakers and the Division Series. The network that isn't showing the World Series in a year would get the All-Star Game.
All the Saturday afternoon games would all be shown on the national broadcasts at 10 and 1 pacific (1 and 4 eastern), with home market protection, so within a blackout region you are guaranteed to see that team's game on Fox or CW. This corrects a glaring flaw in the otherwise well-intentioned plan that was the Baseball Network: "you see what we want you to see" (four games instead of one, I hope MLB isn't as uptight as the NFL) and conflicts in markets with two teams (not only would the Yankees and Mets possibly be seen in different timeslots, in the likely event they're in the same timeslot, the Yankees are on the CW and the Mets are on Fox).
Let's take this Saturday (7/22) games as an example. Here are the games (above the dashed line indicates a game that's already an afternoon Fox game):
CHC at WSH
HOU at NYM
OAK at DET
ATL at PHI
BOS at SEA
NYY at TOR
-----
PIT at FLA
MIL at CIN
MIN at CLE
TEX at CWS
ANA (to me, they're the Anaheim Angels forever!) at KC
BAL at TB
SD at SF
COL at ARI
STL at LA
These games break down easily by league and network, and I've presorted them by time based on time zone:
NL Network AL Network
Early Games
CHC at WSH OAK at DET
HOU at NYM MIN at CLE
ATL at PHI TEX at CWS
PIT at FLA ANA at KC
MIL at CIN BAL at TB
Late Games
SD at SF BOS at SEA
COL at ARI NYY at TOR
STL at LA
NY, LA, and the Bay Area see their games put in different time slots, but Chicago sees both their teams on the early game. But that's not a problem, because both games are on different networks, so Cubs fans can see their team, and White Sox fans can see their team.
Each network would choose one game in each time slot to serve as a "highlight" game for the country in areas that aren't affected by having their home team thrust on them. Looking at today's standings, I would expect those games to be HOU at NYM (ATL at PHI is another possibility), OAK at DET (though TEX at CWS may have more playoff implications), SD at SF (weakest of three evils), and NYY at TOR. Here in Seattle, we would get all those games except NYY at TOR; our local AL Network would show BOS at SEA instead. The same thing would happen in Boston. In Los Angeles, they would show ANA at KC instead of OAK at DET, and STL at LA instead of SD at SF, even though LA might be in the SD blackout area.
All games would be on Extra Innings and mlb.tv. Best of all, there are
no pesky interleague games to break up the nice, neat system. Of course, when those come along, it's just a mess.
For a number of reasons, mainly those I struggled with, this may never happen, but I can dream...
