Historical Major League Baseball over-the-air television broadcasters
Local
American League
National League
Former teams
National
| Network | Years | Additional notes |
| DuMont | 1947–1949 | World Series only from 1947–1949 |
| NBC | 1947–1989 1994–2000 |
World Series and All-Star Game (beginning in 1950) only from 1947–1956 and 1965 Saturday afternoon Game of the Week from 1957–1964 and exclusively from 1966–1989 Monday Night Baseball games from 1967–1969 and 1972–1975 Part of a revenue sharing joint venture with Major League Baseball and ABC called "The Baseball Network" from 1994–1995 All-Star Game (in even numbered years) and postseason games only from 1996–2000 |
| ABC | 1948–1950 1953–1954 1960 1965 1976–1989 1994–1995 |
World Series only from 1948–1950 Saturday afternoon Game of the Week from 1953–1954 and in 1960 and 1965 (exclusive coverage) Monday Night Baseball games from 1976–1988 Thursday Night Baseball in 1989 Part of a revenue sharing joint venture with Major League Baseball and NBC called "The Baseball Network" from 1994–1995 |
| CBS | 1947–1950 1955–1965 1990–1993 |
World Series only from 1947–1950 Saturday afternoon Game of the Week from 1955–1964 New York Yankees games only in 1965 Sporadic, 16 game coverage of Saturday afternoon Game of the Week plus, exclusive network television broadcaster from 1990–1993 |
| Fox | 1996–present | Saturday afternoon Game of the Week beginning on Memorial Day weekend from 1996–2006 Saturday afternoon Game of the Week for the full season since 2007 Exclusive network television broadcaster since 2001 |
Superstations
Postseason coverage
When the League Championship Series was first instituted in 1969, the Major League Baseball television contract at the time allowed a local TV station in the market of each competing team to also carry the LCS games. So, for example, Mets fans in New York could choose to watch either the NBC telecast or Lindsey Nelson, Bob Murphy and Ralph Kiner on WOR-TV.
1983 marked the last time that local telecasts of League Championship Series games were allowed. In 1982, Major League Baseball recognized a problem with this due to the emergence of cable superstations such as WTBS in Atlanta and WGN-TV in Chicago. When TBS tried to petition for the right to do a "local" Braves broadcast of the 1982 NLCS, Major League Baseball got a Philadelphia federal court to ban them on the grounds that as a cable superstation, TBS could not have a nationwide telecast competing with ABC's.
Since 2007, MLB playoff games on TBS are not made available[1] to local over-the-air broadcasters in the participating teams' markets.[2] Under the previous contract, ESPN was required to make those games available on the air in local markets.
See also
References
- Hiestand, Michael (2007-10-09). "Fox's Buck makes pitch for late show". USA Today.
- Postseason exclusivity boosted the price for TBS. If MLB continued to allow local outlets to air their team's games, the rights would have been "significantly diluted," according to Neal Pilson, the former president of CBS Sports who now runs a broadcast consulting company. "The TBS sales people now can assure advertisers that this is the only place where people can see the games," Pilson said. "It's a judgment baseball had to make. It had to balance the revenue stream, which is formidable, against the loss of a certain number of homes."