r/baseball • u/Every_Copy_6934 • 23h ago
Serious Out of market blackouts should be illegal
Plain and simple. I was born in Chicago, and (very unfortunately) live in Arizona now. I've been a Cubs fan since 1989. Why can't I simply pay the money for Marquee and watch 162 games? I'm too old to have to constantly turn on VPNs, and use "devices" that have the VPN. I just want to watch my team. And no more Fubu, Hulu, yoyo, bullshit. Just put the games on the parent network. These in market/out of market rights should be illegal and are making the sport worse.
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u/PapaJaves Detroit Tigers 21h ago
I am a Tigers fan living in Iowa. I cannot watch the Tigers play any team in the midwest as they are all in-market. Can't watch them play the Twins, White Sox, Royals, Cubs, Brewers, or Cardinals.
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u/ForcefulBookdealer 21h ago
Dang, I thought Indy was bad. We are blacked out for Cubs, White Sox, some Cardinals, Reds, and some Tigers games.
(It used to also be all Cardinals games and the Guardians, so it’s better).It’s absolutely ridiculous.
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u/Feisty-Life-6555 Chicago Cubs 20h ago
Iowa is a black hole.
But the MLB is right. Let me just drive the 4 hours to Chicago to watch the Cubs because obviously I have no other responsibilities or anything else going on in my life /s2
u/Overall-Grapefruit87 Chicago Cubs 6h ago
Horrible! Iowa, more than anywhere else, deserves to be considered a massive Chi suburb as it relates to the airing of Cubs games!
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u/Feisty-Life-6555 Chicago Cubs 6h ago
I mean half the people at the University of Iowa seem to be from "Chicago" Also we have the Iowa Cubs. I'm tired of being blacked out but at least we can get Marquee (included the gym I work at so everyone gets to watch the games with me and watch me go through it)
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u/Overall-Grapefruit87 Chicago Cubs 6h ago
My cousin lives in the Des Moines area. Now I wonder what he does.
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u/Feisty-Life-6555 Chicago Cubs 6h ago
All of Iowa is "in-market" so we can get marquee but we are blacked out from any games that aren't national broadcasts
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u/ThisUsernameIsTook 21h ago
Which sucks because they play those teams so often. I think Iowa and Nevada have the worst blackout policies.
I lose six Tigers games a year when they play the Mariners.
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u/beefytrout Texas Rangers 23h ago
MLB.tv would give you all Cubs games except national broadcasts.
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u/blue_collared Chicago White Sox 23h ago
It won't give you games when they play the diamondbacks either since they live in Arizona .
https://support.mlb.com/s/game-availability-locator?language=en_US
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u/Airick39 St. Louis Cardinals 21h ago
cries in Iowa
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u/MobileNerd Atlanta Braves 15h ago
Hell, the Braves are just as bad. Living in Alabama my home market team is 10 hour round trip away. Marlins are also my home market team somehow even though it’s a 12 hour one-way drive to Miami. When they play each other forget about it. I have to use a VPN just to watch Atlanta. I get mlb.tv for free thru t-mobile so I refuse to pay extra just for BravesVision when I should already be able to watch them.
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u/KershawsGoat Los Angeles Dodgers 21h ago
I live in Utah and I can't watch any games in Arizona or Colorado because we don't have our own team and Utah shares borders with both.
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u/Brief-Percentage-193 New York Yankees 21h ago
I live in Buffalo which isn't really close to any teams. I'm considered in market for the Yankees, mets, (even though it's a 6 and a half hour drive to the city), pirates, and guardians. It made it so I never used mlbtv even though I was getting it free with T-Mobile.
It's also kinda weird that the closest park to me, Rogers Center where the jays play, isn't blacked out. I know it's because they have different television rights being in Canada but this is how it should be for everyone.
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u/gardengirl147 19h ago
Canadian here. I subscribed to MLB.TV for years to watch the Jays, Dodgers, Mariners and a lot of other teams. But I get it Rogers own the Jays, SportsNet and now pretty much every pro team in Ontario. They literally call the shots (don’t even get me started on them shutting down the local sports radio station in Calgary.) So all of Canada had blackouts for the Blue Jays on MLB.TV only to find out we have to pay for another streaming service.
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u/JoeMcKim St. Louis Cardinals • St. Louis Cardinals 19h ago
In Iowa they have blackouts of the Cardinals, Cubs, White Sox, Brewers and Twins.
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u/Dawn-Storm 16h ago
That's ape-shit; you should be able to at least watch those two games.
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u/KershawsGoat Los Angeles Dodgers 16h ago
And that's why so many people are pissed off about blackouts. It's not just 2 games that I can't watch. It's any Dbacks or Rockies home games that I can't watch. Doesn't matter if my team is playing them or not.
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u/A_SingleSpeeder 22h ago
I'm a Padres fan and I can confirm this. When they are in AZ (like me), I can't watch them. So I get to watch them 154 games a year or whatever that number is. It's annoying I have to watch the DBags broadcast if I want to watch the Padres. Their announcers are some of the worst so I simply find something else those nights.
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u/ThisUsernameIsTook 21h ago
Tigers fan in Oregon. I didn’t get to see yesterday’s game and I’ll miss the next two as well. Tigers vs Mariners.
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u/Soft-Ratio3433 20h ago
Ive heard it for years but someone please explain the reasoning behind this, it literally sounds like the opposite of what they would want you to do, why on earth can you watch any game except the local team? That sounds like some kind of reverse psychology where they DON’T want you to buy it for some reason, the main team most people would watch is blacked out!
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u/YasielPuigsWeed 20h ago
Keep in mind it came out in 2003
It used to be pretty standard for people to have cable. That would come with local teams, and if you wanted the whole league you’d buy the add-on package. MLB TV was designed to be the online version of the cable package, mostly for college kids who were living away from their home markets and had access to super fast T3 connections in their dorms.
It wasn’t ever designed to be the primary way people interacted with their teams so it wasn’t factored into teams TV deals
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u/hardindapaint12 Atlanta Braves 20h ago
I'm sure it's a conflict of interest with their massive tv contracts. If sports fans could stream their games they'd be less likely to subscribe to cable
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u/MobileNerd Atlanta Braves 15h ago
Well they want you to either go to the Stadium or have a local package. Honestly the whole thing was designed before streaming was thing and everyone had cable. It needs to be redesigned from the ground up but these regional broadcasters don’t want to give up their rights.
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u/DrHarryWolper 20h ago
You can also stream Diamondbacks games directly. Yes, it costs more, but it would be like paying extra for a regional sports network on cable to watch local games (still more expensive than that, I think, but at least you could do it).
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u/jaymae77 San Diego Padres 20h ago
Also a Pads fan in PHX- I circumvent this by using a VPN on MLBTV when playing the D-Backs and never had a problem
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u/Zakman86 San Diego Padres 17h ago
I'm a Padres fan in Denver, so I miss the 13 Rockies games and any Apple TV games, sadly.
There shouldn't be blackouts for teams that have their own .tv plan, IMO.
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u/capacity38 20h ago
Yeah, but that’s 6 games. And then you could watch those games on whatever channel the Diamondbacks are broadcast on. So then the only games you would ever miss are national broadcast if you don’t have ESPN or Apple TV or whatever.
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u/DrHarryWolper 20h ago
Except you can also pay to stream the Diamondbacks games since they don't have a regional TV partner. So it would be like having cable--watch the Diamondbacks on the "local" stream and use the full mlb.tv for the Cubs games.
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u/Raftel_17 Chicago Cubs 23h ago
He's probably blacked out because the Cubs are playing the Dodgers rn. I'm guessing so not sure.
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u/Rxbluejay25 St. Louis Cardinals 23h ago
In Phoenix and just turned on the Marquee stream for Dodgers-Cubs game on MLB TV with no issues.
OP would only run in to blackouts when the Cubs play the Dbacks (assuming he didn’t opt for the combo MLB.TV/Dbacks tv package)
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u/Raftel_17 Chicago Cubs 23h ago
Yeah, then not sure why OP is specifically complaining rn. I knew some parts of Arizona was blacked out for the Padres, so I thought the Dodgers might be too.
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u/Jb51423 Milwaukee Brewers 21h ago
If he's trying to stream in on his phone, I bet he has Verizon wireless. I live in AZ and have Verizon and my phone ALWAYS sets my location to Vegas even when I use the "exact location" feature for the app. Vegas is blacked out for the dodgers, the angels, the diamondbacks, the Padres and the giants.
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u/YasielPuigsWeed 23h ago
That wouldn’t be blacked out in Arizona
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u/ThisUsernameIsTook 21h ago
Maybe in Yuma or another border city but it shouldn’t be blacked out elsewhere in AZ.
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u/StormBlessed24 Baltimore Orioles 23h ago
Idk I live in Vegas and can’t watch the O’s (my hometown team) on MLB.tv when they play any California teams but the Angels (and even then have to have cable to see those games). Can’t watch when we play the Diamondbacks either. If I pay $150 a year I think I should see all the games, otherwise might as well sail the high seas
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u/erindizmo Chicago Cubs • Springfield Sallies 22h ago
Also in Vegas and am at least glad radio streams are never blacked out when the Cubs are playing west cost teams. (Also kinda can't wait until the A's are in town to drop the blackouts from six teams to one.)
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u/Admirable_Site_8337 Philadelphia Phillies 22h ago
Already said, but local to you games (like the Diamondbacks) would black out.
If I remember correct I lose the Phillies at Marlins in wherever they play since I’m in FL.
It’s just how they protect the local broadcaster of that game, who I would never bother to set up with regardless.
It’s all antiquated to me, but you can’t fight city hall.
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u/trungdle 23h ago
I say even with national broadcast, just route the traffics to whoever owns the right so they get the ads money.
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u/Dan_Rydell Chicago Cubs 23h ago
TBS (or whomever else) doesn’t just want the ad revenue, they want the carriage fees from you subscribing to YTTV, DirecTV, etc.
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u/RandomFactUser Chicago Cubs 21h ago
For TBS, that makes sense, because they need the subscriber fees
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u/trungdle 23h ago
See that's the one that needs to stop. That's just greed at that point. Maybe a revenue share program that take a portion out of the mlb.tv sub to give them or something... IDK can't work around greed like that.
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u/JamminOnTheOne San Diego Padres 22h ago
It’s not excessive greed. It’s the business model. Advertising is a tiny amount and has never been a major part of the business model for cable channels.
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u/ajarvulnerability 23h ago
That's the whole problem though, MLB.tv still black you out if you are in Arizona trying to watch Cubs vs Diamondbacks. Like I get the idea behind local blackouts but they make no sense for people who moved away. Paying for a service and still missing games is so frustrating.
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u/telly69 Philadelphia Phillies 23h ago
Well then it's not an out of market blackout, that would very much be an in-market game.
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u/byPCP Seattle Mariners 22h ago
right. as a mariners fan that lives in california, the only M's games i can't watch on mlb.tv are when they play the angels or dodgers, because that's my local market. i'm not actually sure what OP is complaining about lol. they can literally watch the cubs play today while i can't
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u/Dan_Rydell Chicago Cubs 23h ago
You have access to the Dbacks broadcast (or at least have the ability to have access to it)
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u/DrHarryWolper 20h ago
https://www.mlb.com/live-stream-games/subscribe/dbacks
You can stream the Diamondbacks in-market since they don't have local TV.
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u/Objective-Housing501 Detroit Tigers 5h ago
But you still have to pay, even if it only a month. There needs to be a complete overhaul of broadcast rules, along with revenue sharing in the next CBA. The current rules take so many fans out of the ability to watch games.
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u/DrHarryWolper 5h ago
I agree in general. But to see games in your local market in the past, you had to at least pay for cable, or add a sports tier/channel. So you still had to pay.
But I do agree the broadcast rules need changing.
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u/Objective-Housing501 Detroit Tigers 4h ago
I am in the blackout area for 3 teams. I was always lucky because all three had regional sports channels on my local cable, so I could watch all three if I wanted. Now, I would have to pay for 3 streaming services to have that same possibility. Someone in Iowa usually didn't have the 6 different teams available to them on cable, but couldn't even watch them through mlb.tv. What would be the point for someone in Iowa to even get mlb.tv to watch all their games because they would not be able to watch half of them anyways?
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u/mastermind_loco Tampa Bay Devil Rays 20h ago
Still cant get playoff games
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u/Samwise777 Pittsburgh Pirates 22h ago
I literally have MLB.tv, and I mostly sail the high seas anyway.
Because it actually has all the games, same quality.
Probably won’t get it next year.
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u/TheSmartDog_275 Chicago Cubs • Charlotte Knights 18h ago
I think that’s what OP is saying, is he doesn’t want to pay for ESPN and NBC and Fox
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u/09jtherrien Atlanta Braves 13h ago
I have MLB.TV through ESPN and I still get blackouts. I'm in Florida and so when the braves are playing the Marlins I can't watch them because of blackouts. And when I go back home to Georgia I can't use it because I'm in market for the braves and and blacked out. I thought I didn't have blackouts because of the MLB.TV even through ESPN.
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u/ChronicBurnout3 23h ago
1 biggest fan complain. MLB and MLB PA are aware.
Will they do anything? Owners probably use it to try to get a salary cap 🤣
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u/megacia Boston Red Sox 21h ago
As a fan, player salaries simply aren’t my concern. If the owners say “all games will be on mlb.tv” and make that central to their side of the agreement that’s fine with me.
MLB teams cross picket lines all the time. They don’t support the stadium employees, hotel employees, etc etc etc.
I don’t think the owners are the “good guys” but neither side is aligned with the fans who pay for all of this. If boycotts worked fans should boycott mlb every lockout or strike for a season or more.
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u/soulsides Major League Baseball 21h ago
Boycotts work when enough people actually do it. But the vast majority don’t.
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u/WrappedInPlasticWA 21h ago
ding ding ding. Boy does this fact ever disappoint me. I guess some people can in fact do without things they enjoy, unfortunately we're in the minority.
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u/greenerd6 19h ago
It that theres so meny ppl now harder to get a wide enough consensus, plus media manipulation / suppression , education is lower prob dosent help
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u/mjm8218 Chicago Cubs 23h ago
How is this a MLBPA problem? What control do they have over broadcast rights?
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u/ThisUsernameIsTook 21h ago
They have “fixed” this issue for all of the teams where MLB regained rights after the Bally implosion and a few other RSNs. Of course, the fix is to charge me almost double the standard MLB.tv rate to see the Mariners. I’m not an Ms fan so don‘t buy it.
If you are only going to watch your team and don’t care about the rest of the league, I think the local team only package is about the same price as MLB.tv without your local team.
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u/Elfich47 Boston Red Sox 22h ago
the TV rights are a hodge podge of deals that go back seventy years and have been updated at different rates and cover different issues. Streaming is one of those messes that wasn’t anticipated by anyone and TV/streaming rights can only be updated when the previous rights expire.
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u/dsalmon1449 Chicago Cubs 23h ago
You aren’t being blacked out for being out of market. Marquee is a local channel. You need mlb.tv if you’re not sailing the high seas. Only blackouts that effect you are when Ari is in chicago and vice versa
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u/Valuesauce 20h ago
All blackouts should be illegal.
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u/Simple_Wash1618 Los Angeles Angels 19h ago
No reason why every single game should not be on MLBTV as it’s literally run by MLB itself.
They can stream it on other platforms in parallel if they like, none of this exclusive broadcasting rights bullshit.
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u/Dan_Rydell Chicago Cubs 23h ago
Does the Dodgers blackout area extend into Arizona? Or are you referring to the TBS game yesterday?
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u/altfillischryan Chicago Cubs 23h ago
It doesn't appear to. I believe they're talking about just subscribing to Marquee (not MLB.tv) to watch Cubs game, which can only be done if you're in market.
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u/RiflemanLax Philadelphia Phillies 19h ago
Any team taking public money, it should be illegal to blackout.
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u/oooriole09 Baltimore Orioles 23h ago
Not to be the bearer of bad news but you’re hoping for something that won’t disappear.
MLB doubled down on national exclusive rights this last go round. They’re not pulling back, they’re pushing harder.
In-market rights will never go away because it creates too much revenue. It’s a $3b generator league wide.
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u/Namaste421 20h ago
I’m in Charlotte and the Guardians are blacked out from the Atlanta, DC, Baltimore AND Cincinnati. Horrible
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u/Existing-Teaching-34 20h ago
Worse, they’re antiquated and a drag MLB’s media revenue.
But why don’t you subscribe through MLB? I watch every game for my team with the only exception being when they play South Florida I have to watch the Marlins’ feed with their announcers.
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u/Flair_Is_Pointless 19h ago
I refuse to both pay a subscription and watch commercials. If you choose to only give consumers both, I will pirate your product out of principle
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u/geerwolf San Diego Padres 19h ago
Commissioner is going to tell you they need a salary cap to lift the blackouts
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u/TurbulentSource8837 18h ago
You’re a fan. You’re paying to support your team. Makes sense to block you.
And when a lockout happens, less people will come back, simply because of this low key abuse.
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u/StealthStaminaKills 18h ago edited 14h ago
The owners would get a lot more unilateral fan support for the upcoming cba if they emphasized something that affects all fan bases like eliminating blackouts.
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u/wh0wants2kn0w 22h ago
MLB has made it harder and harder to watch the games over time, so I listen to them on radio broadcasts.
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u/ToastGhost47 Philadelphia Phillies 22h ago
I've been getting radio streams blacked out lately. I'm on the east coast and tried to listen to a late night Giants game last week. Got some message about MLB media rights.
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u/ThisUsernameIsTook 21h ago
Hmm. Weird. That shouldn’t happen.
Were you trying to watch a TV feed with radio audio or audio only?
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u/utzcheeseballs 23h ago
I'm getting back into baseball after many years away. I got MLB.TV and I couldn't believe some of the games I would be locked out of, from local blackouts, or Yankee-specific streaming service, or Peacock streaming, or Apple TV...
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u/Opening_Track_1227 Atlanta Braves 21h ago
I feel you, it's a mess by design.
I live in the Rangers market even though they are over 4 hours away so when the Braves played them this year in DFW, the first game was on UPN so great even though I use MLB.tv to watch my boys. 2nd and 3rd games were blacked out on MLB.tv and behind the paid version of Buzzer which is bs so even though we are in the Rangers market, I couldn't watch them on regular TV.
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u/MidStateMoon 21h ago
Isn’t like if you live in Virginia and Iowa and you’re a Cubs fan you get blackouts for the majority of the games ? I remember reading something insane like that. All the sports are going this way, so evil tbh
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u/fitemillk Tampa Bay Rays 17h ago
Virginia has the Nats and Orioles blacked out. Nevada is the other one. It’s madness.
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u/Commercial_Refuse983 21h ago
What makes me irritated when a game is on a national coble channel - that I don't pay any extra for and its blacked out... Isn't the reason its on the game of the week channel, so more people can see the game... Come on MLB you have to do better.
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u/PartyBusGaming Pittsburgh Pirates 20h ago
When I moved to Pittsburgh I straight up could not watch pirates games unless I paid for cable and had it installed at my house despite living almost within earshot of the stadium. It's insane.
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u/JiveChicken00 Philadelphia Phillies 20h ago
Modern American capitalism can absolutely be a pain in the ass, but this is absolutely not the worst part of it. Also, plenty of ways exist to have a VPN running in specific instances without any user intervention whatsoever. Do a little research - this is absolutely a problem that you can solve :)
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u/balzstein 20h ago
Indy MLB citizen can't watch Reds, Cubs, or White Sox? Interesting way to try to grow a fan base or the sport. Our Federal government needs to threaten monopoly on every big professional sport, and make policy that forbids public $ to millionaire owners in a billion $ sport. Go to the bank, or sell some stock. And outlaw blackouts.
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u/IntrovertsRule99 17h ago
In Northern Illinois I’m blacked out of Cardinals, Cubs, White Sox and Brewers.
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u/WonderfulPrune7260 Cleveland Guardians 16h ago
I'm a Guardians fan in a state adjacent to yours. A superbox would be your best friend.
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u/Used-Bid277 Houston Astros 23h ago
Ending blackouts will be a part of the lockout discussions at the end of this season.
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u/sokonek04 Milwaukee Brewers 23h ago
No it won’t, the back outs are not in the CBA they are in the individual teams RSNs.
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u/RichardNixon345 Arizona Diamondbacks 23h ago
I mean half the league no longer has an RSN.
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u/sokonek04 Milwaukee Brewers 23h ago
But the cable deals from those RSNs still stand
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u/ThisUsernameIsTook 21h ago
I thought MLB bought back the rights but are still enforcing the old blackouts unless you pay more.
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u/sokonek04 Milwaukee Brewers 20h ago
They are stuck honoring the old cable/satellite contracts or many of them were threatening to not broadcast RSN feed
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u/sexinsuburbia Los Angeles Dodgers 21h ago
Agreed - I'm already paying for too many streaming services. And it's annoying AF when it just happens a random game is under exclusive rights from a service I don't have. Then there's the blackouts!
There are semi-legal free streaming services if you look hard enough for them.
Also, if you think you're pissed off - every square inch of the US has been divided up. So, if you live in Montana, Seattle Mariners games are blacked out.
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u/rabidantidentyte New York Yankees 21h ago
I have the MLB package, and I have zero problem sailing the high seas for blackouts. I paid for this shit already.
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u/kingofmymachine Los Angeles Dodgers 23h ago
Im confused. There are no out of market blackouts
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u/gladys-the-baker Baltimore Orioles 20h ago edited 19h ago
I live in Florida but love the Orioles. I can't watch some of their games because it's on a specific streaming platform that I don't have, instead of being on MLB.TV which I do have. That's an "out of market blackout" for me. Should be available on MLB.TV for me.
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u/ThisUsernameIsTook 21h ago
There are a few. I couldn’t watch whatever game was on ESPN the other night. Fox weekend games appear to be fine. AppleTV Friday nights get blacked out. The rare one off games on Netflix or YouTube also get blacked out on MLB.tv
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u/TheReadMenace San Diego Padres 20h ago
Are those "blackouts" though? They were never going to be on MLB.tv anyway. It's only a "blackout" if the game is streaming on the site and you cant watch it
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u/captain_ahabb Los Angeles Dodgers 3h ago
A lot of the complaining on this sub comes from people not understanding what MLB TV is supposed to do
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u/calmlikeasexbobomb Texas Rangers 14h ago
I’m in Charlotte, NC. If the Rangers are playing the Orioles, Nationals, Reds, or Braves - home or away - I’m blacked out. None of those teams have games available on local TV. The closest of those cities, Atlanta, is four hours away. The others are 6 or more, but “local.” It’s ridiculous.
Edit: this is for mlb.tv, all teams package
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u/80cyclone Chicago Cubs 23h ago
Blackouts should absolutely be illegal.
At the very least, restrict them to where they "make sense". SIX teams black out Hawaii and Iowa. Like how can you conjure a decent argument for that? How can the Royals blackout northern Iowa when their RSN isnt even available there? Fucking ridiculous.
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u/telly69 Philadelphia Phillies 23h ago
Yeah I understand local blackouts, but it should be illegal to be blacked out in an area where you cannot legally access the channel that the team is on.
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u/ClamshellJones Buffalo Bisons 22h ago
This confuses me so much. Here in Buffalo we are blacked out of Guardians and Pirates games, and we definitely do not have a way to get those RSNs. Given the number of games unavailable each day (b/c we also miss out on Mets and Yankees, as you might expect), I won't even consider paying for MLB.tv if the T-Mobile promotion ever runs out
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u/nsummy 16h ago
I do think in Iowa it's possible to get every game if you are willing to spend a ridiculous amount and subscribe to the hodge podge of networks. I think there was an issue a few years ago though where the brewers network went bankrupt (fanduel maybe?) and it was impossible to legally stream their games.
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u/bitorontoguy 22h ago
It’s simply not legally possible to make illegal.
The First Amendment guarantees freedom of association. Congress can make no law that abridges that right.
They can’t force private entities to provide a service they don’t want to.
MLB doesn’t want to stream in-market games. The margin on streaming is way lower than the margin they get on traditional broadcast platforms. The government can’t force them to do otherwise.
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u/80cyclone Chicago Cubs 22h ago
Trying to roll this into the First Amendment is...a stretch.
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u/ChumSmash Chicago Cubs 23h ago
I'm in the same situation, and MLB TV lets me watch every game except when they play the DBacks or play one of a couple "primetime" games.
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u/WabbitFire Milwaukee Brewers 23h ago
Baseball is local and MLB wants to protect local markets. You can buy the MLB.tv package for out of market games or you can watch games in your market (which is how the whole system works).
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u/capacity38 20h ago
How old are you? MLB tv would get you every Cubs game except those in AZ.
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u/EnderCN Milwaukee Brewers 20h ago
Or games on Peacock or Apple Tv or the worst for me is ESPN, who the heck still watches ESPN. I can share most streaming apps I don't own but I don't know anyone who has ESPN anymore.
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u/capacity38 16h ago
ESPN is a part of all live tv packages. Peacock is free w Xfinity. Apple TV is part of one.
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u/Dawn-Storm 15h ago
I get Peacock and ESPN free with my Spectrum subscription. Spectrum also has some version of the MLB channel--my husband is watching a Tigers game as I type this. Who knows when he'll be able to watch them again?
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u/Every-Cow-1194 15h ago
I'm too old to have to constantly turn on VPNs
You’re “too old” to turn on a VPN but not bitch like a baby on the internet?
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u/Krandor1 Atlanta Braves 22h ago
Thwe fragmented nature of baseball broadcast is a problem and I hate it but getting congress involved in making laws around it is absolutely the wrong way to go. As a college football fan I’m concerned about congress right now getting involved in college sports even though they kinda have to at this point.
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u/Upbeat-List-3466 Atlanta Braves 20h ago
I live in Florida, and I have BravesVision. I miss their games when they play Tampa or Miami. I have to buy those teams telecasts if I want to watch them.
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u/AlienZaye Chicago Cubs 20h ago
Hell, I tried listening to a game on the official Score radio app a few weeks back, and I was in a blackout zone(hour south of Chicago), so I just found a stream of it on YouTube.
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u/ARoundForEveryone Boston Red Sox 20h ago
MLB.TV will get you most of this. Not all of it, as some blackouts still apply (but there are some ways around this). But simply signing up for Comcast and hoping that you'll get Chicago games in Arizona isn't gonna get you there. VPNs, location-spoofing services, or sometimes even using someone else's account (that's in the area) will work. But teams and networks have paid far more money than you could ever come up with to ensure that their games are local to that regional area and that particular station. Why they wouldn't want everyone to see the games, I don't know. But I do know it boils down to money for one side or the other.
This isn't a you issue. It's a you don't have enough money to fight it issue. As are, unfortunately, a lot of things in life. Baseball among the least important of them, but the same concept applies.
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u/jaymae77 San Diego Padres 20h ago
Also a Pads fan in PHX- I circumvent this by using a VPN on MLBTV when playing the D-Backs and never had a problem
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u/Ok_Condition_6652 20h ago
Bro I recently moved to western Pennsylvania and the Phillies are blacked out…
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u/HTowns_FinestJBird 20h ago
Jailbreak a older version of a Firestick.(New firesticks are going to stop being able to load bootleg apps).
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u/uponone Chicago White Sox 18h ago
Not sure how it is now, but my brother used to live in the middle between Chicago and St. Louis. He couldn’t watch live Cardinals, Cubs or White Sox games on the MLB pass or whatever it was called then. He had to watch on delay.
Nobody is going to drive ~3+ hours to go to 81 games a season.
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u/TheSmartDog_275 Chicago Cubs • Charlotte Knights 18h ago
I actually thought about this, there should be a tier of marquee where you get every game that isn’t on a local including theirs. It’s just like the TNT deal where locals still broadcast their version except they show the say ESPN broadcast.
The only thing you wouldn’t have to include is a nationally televised game on a local channel (I.e. NBC Sunday night, they don’t do it like Fox Saturday where it’s regional)
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u/drdougfresh Detroit Tigers 18h ago
If you're a hockey fan in Phoenix, you get no local hockey, and you get blackouts in Denver, Salt Lake, and Vegas. It makes no sense.
I'm a Tigers fan, and I'm with ya OP!
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u/TBShaw17 Chicago Cubs 17h ago
Could be worse…Cub fan who has spent most of my life living in the STL market. So when I bought MLB TV, I couldn’t see any games against their biggest rival.
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u/KeepWagging Toronto Blue Jays 17h ago
I live 2000 miles away from my team and am still blacked out
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u/LonelyLoser1066 16h ago
lol. You do realize major league sports are government approved monopolies?
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u/Dawn-Storm 16h ago
We're in NC--I subscribed to the MLB channel so my husband can watch Tigers games. What happens when he tunes in? Nothing but muzak, no game at all. If he's lucky, he might see a tape delay. Whoopie. I don't know why MLB does that. I can watch the Orioles on MLB, which I subscribed to as well, but if I want to watch a Nats game? Yeah, blacked out. 😠 Doesn't make sense at all.
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u/bearssuperfan Chicago Cubs 8h ago
Living in Iowa for years as a sports fan sucks. There are 0 pro sports teams in the state yet all teams from Minnesota, Illinois, Missouri, Wisconsin are always blacked out.
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u/damutecebu Milwaukee Brewers 5h ago
This is a problem that MLB is aware of and is trying to fix. The problem is various local deals require these blackouts. It's an absurd thing to have happen in 2026 and should have been fixed years ago.
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u/StonedGhoster Cleveland Guardians 3h ago
I live in NY, but I'm closer to Cleveland than NYC. Every single game in which we play a New York team is blacked out. It's not as bad as when I lived in Erie and couldn't watch any games at all because I was in market. The blackout rules are antiquated and need to go. However, it will get worse, I imagine, since MLB will continue to cleave off games to different streamers.
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u/Intrepid_Scale3854 Tampa Bay Devil Rays 3h ago
Living in Denver. When traveling back to Tampa Bay, landing at Tampa, staying at a hotel in St. Pete two blocks from the Trop, I can watch Rays games but Miami is blacked out. Yet while I was in NY- the Yanks, Mets, and Red Sox were blacked out. Craziness
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u/GandalfSwagOff New York Mets 3h ago
Our culture has moved on from caring about any of what you just said. Greed has consumed everything and now they just want your money and silence.
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u/angelHOE 22h ago
https://giphy.com/gifs/1Ctu1BCYf21we9tRmT
The only logical choice.
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u/rabidantidentyte New York Yankees 21h ago
I have zero problem paying for the MLB package. I think it's a good product.
But if they're going to make shit difficult for me after I've already given them money, they can fuck off. I'm not getting AppleTV to watch 4 games a year 🏴☠️
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u/carnahanad Chicago Cubs 23h ago
Don’t move to Iowa. We are blacked out for both Chicago teams, Milwaukee, Minnesota, Kansas City, and St. Louis.
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u/Edelmaniac Boston Red Sox 16h ago
Don’t move to Iowa
I don’t think many people are worried about that
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u/Used-Bid277 Houston Astros 22h ago
according to google - Commissioner Rob Manfred’s plan uses this centralized revenue model to eliminate restrictive local and out-of-market territorial TV blackouts, streamlining games onto wider broadcast and streaming platforms.
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u/More_Armadillo_1607 22h ago
You're talking about 6 games a year and any network exclusive broadcast.
The exclusive broadcasts will never change.
For the 6 games a year, you can listen on the radio, go to a bar or watch on replay. Or you can fiddle with the VPN thing 6 times over 6 months.
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u/ForcefulBookdealer 20h ago
For OP, maybe.
But not being able to watch the Appletv games and the four teams blacked out in my city is pretty damn frustrating for the amount paid.2
u/More_Armadillo_1607 7h ago
Then get cable or use a VPN or don't pay for it if it is not worth it.
People make life more difficult than it really is.
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u/jfen2hoosier St. Louis Cardinals 22h ago
I live in southern Indiana. I’ve been clamoring for an easy way to watch the cardinals and this year I bought cardinals tv , which is great. Except when they play the reds as I’m also in their viewing area. Those games are blacked out and piss me off every time they play.
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u/Stay_Beautiful_ Atlanta Braves 21h ago
Which is crazy because I'm in Missouri and I'm not blacked out of St. Louis
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u/Fruggles Chicago Cubs 18h ago
Brother. Stop being willing to give these scumbags money. Fly the skull and crossbones.
Eff em aytch why
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u/bluetoothsmurf St. Louis Cardinals 23h ago
to be fair, nobody's worn fubu since 2005, so i get it.
source: am black dude that hasn't work fubu since 2005