Bally Sports considering dropping the Texas Rangers ahead of the 2024 MLB season
Bally Sports and its parent company, Diamond Sports Group, announced in a court filing on Nov. 9th that they reached an agreement with their creditors to resolve any remaining issues for the 2024 MLB season after which Bally will step away from broadcasting baseball games. The deal is not yet official because Bally’s parent company DSG is in bankruptcy court and must have the agreement approved by a judge. However, according to a report in the Athletic, Bally Sports is considering dropping the Texas Rangers and Cleveland Guardians ahead of the upcoming MLB season and will only air games for the remaining nine MLB teams they have deals with.
On Wednesday Bally’s lawyers explained their rationale in court. “Our intention is to broadcast almost all of (our) Major League Baseball teams next year,” one of Diamond’s attorneys said in today’s bankruptcy proceedings (relayed by The Athletic ). “There are a few, a very few, for which we do not have agreements in place. And that, frankly, at this point, are too expensive for us to broadcast without concessions. I am told that those discussions are taking place, there have been reach-outs to both of the teams involved.”
“There’s no deal with MLB, there’s no deal with the Rangers, we don’t know what (Diamond’s) intention is with respect to the Rangers,” said a layer for the Texas Rangers in court on Wednesday. If Bally were to drop the Rangers the team would have the option of finding a new broadcast partner to carry their games and in the event, they couldn’t in time for the 2024 season the MLB could air games as it did for the Arizona Diamondbacks and San Diego Padres during the 2023 season. Bally Sports has broadcasted the team’s games since Diamond Sports Group obtained the rights from Fox Sports Southwest.
The deal led to consternation from many fans who were unable to watch the Rangers game due to many TV providers not carrying Bally Sports. Since 2020 many TV providers have been in a contract dispute with DSG, which owns 21 regional sports networks and is a subsidiary of Sinclair Broadcasting. It has the rights to to over 40 professional sports teams, several of which are in the Metroplex including the Rangers, Mavericks and Stars. Rangers fans in the Metroplex had to use DirecTV, DirecTV Stream, TV Max or Spectrum if they wanted to watch Bally Sports Southwest. Bally Sports Southwest did offer an app for fans but the cost was $19.99 per month, considerably more than ESPN+, Disney+ or Max. Earlier this year, the Rangers almost received their TV rights due to Bally skipping an April payment, which caused the Rangers, the MLB, and other teams to take Bally to court, eventually leading to Bally paying the Rangers rights fees. The Texas Rangers and their fans will have to wait to see what decision Bally and it’s parent company DSG decide in respect to the Rangers.
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