ESPN, MLB have opt-outs of current rights deal

With a diminished profile on the network over the last few years, could ESPN do what seemed unthinkable and walk away from Major League Baseball? Could the reverse happen, with MLB walking away from ESPN? Those hypotheticals have recently come up and apparently are both possible.

The New York Post's Andrew Marchand discussed ESPN's options as Disney's sports division has an opt-out clause on its current broadcast rights contract with MLB that can be exercised after the 2025 season. Though this is two years away, what's going on right now with the media company and the industry at large will have significant influence on the ESPN's decision.

Marchand puts much of the concern of the deal's future on ESPN's showcase for the sport, "Sunday Night Baseball," which has lacked juice for much of the last decade. He noted that the weekly broadcasts were solid but not spectacular in 2023:

"SNB ratings were respectable, but dropped 2 percent this season. This decrease was likely because of the Yankees, Red Sox and Mets being terrible. SNB still averaged in the range of 1.5 million viewers. This is what SNB consistently rates year after year. So there wasn’t a significant dropoff, but these numbers don’t necessarily add up with the amount of money they’re spending."

ESPN spends $550 million per season on MLB rights, a decline from the previous broadcast deal and a reflection of the league's place on the totem pole both at the network and the country overall. ESPN puts much of its programming might behind the NFL, NBA and college football, though it still dials up the hype around its exclusive rights to MLB's All-Star festivities, including the Home Run Derby and the All-Star Game itself.

Save for the postseason and the Midsummer Classic, MLB hasn't captured the zeitgeist like it used to throughout the entirety of the regular season. There are multiple reasons for it — from generational changes to how fans consume sports to an emphasis on sabermetrics that completely changed how the game itself has been played. Begrudgingly, the league office and team owners have tried to address the lack of attraction to baseball with pace-of-play changes that have limited defensive shifts, increased stolen bases and shaved off 24 minutes from the average game.

Yet, despite excitement around the League Championship Series round, the viewership — even with the lack of competition on non-NFL and college football days — continues to decrease as the playoffs progress. If this continues to be the trend, one has to wonder if MLB will continue to be worthwhile for ESPN as it still remains in cost-cutting mode with many of Disney's changes in 2023.