Major League Baseball should step away from the batter’s box on its deal with DirecTV, Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) urged Tuesday in hearings convened by the Senate Commerce Committee, of which he is chairman. But with the start of the season just days away, time is running out for a compromise.
The hearings were called after baseball agreed to a $700 million deal to make DirecTV the exclusive carrier for its out-of-market regular-season game package, which is called MLB Extra Innings.
In early March, MLB gave the two other previous carriers of the service, cable-based InDemand and satellite service Dish Network, the opportunity to match the offer by the end of the month. However, when InDemand made just such an offer last week, MLB rejected it in under an hour.
InDemand, a consortium owned by three major cable providers, made another offer on the day of the hearings, to carry the package under the same terms as DirecTV but to put off the question of a future 24-hour baseball channel. This deal, too, was rejected, although under pressure from Sen. Kerry, MLB’s chief operating officer Bob Dupuy agreed to meet face-to-face with InDemand president Rob Jacobson, according to the New York Times.
If the DirecTV deal becomes final, it is likely that numerous fans who were not previously satellite owners will run out and buy dishes, so as not to miss any of their favorite teams’ games when the season starts April 1.
45 million fans will miss out if DirecTV gets exclucivity. MLB is all about the money, not the fans!
What doesn’t make sense is why everyone is blaming MLB. They gave the cable people the opportunity to match the offer, but, amazingly, they’ve TWICE screwed around with it, trying to offer MLB less than the terms of the deal. If cable loses out, they have only themselves to blame.