Sinclair subsidiary Diamond Sports Group has decided to no longer pay Major League Baseball's San Diego Padres and has dropped the team from the Bally Sports regional sports networks portfolio.
“Diamond Sports Group (DSG) has decided not to provide additional funding to the San Diego RSN that would enable it to make the rights payment to the San Diego Padres during the grace period and will no longer be broadcasting Padres games after Tuesday, May 30," Diamond said in a statement provided to TV Tech sister brand Next TV Tuesday afternoon.
"While DSG has significant liquidity and has been making rights payments to teams, the economics of the Padres’ contract were not aligned with market realities," Diamond added. "MLB has forced our hand by its continued refusal to negotiate direct-to-consumer (DTC) streaming rights for all teams in our portfolio despite our proposal to pay every team in full in exchange for those rights. We are continuing to broadcast games for teams under our contracts.”
MLB says it will support teams that are no longer receiving compensation from Diamond and will offer Padres games via its MLB.TV app for free until June 4. Starting next Monday, June 5, Padres fans will be charged $20 per month of $75 for the remainder of the regular season and will also mean that local blackout rules will not apply.
Fans will also be able to catch the games on a new channel via cable, satellite and streaming.
NextTV has the story.
