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MLB announced Tuesday that it will produce and broadcast local games for the Cleveland Guardians, Milwaukee Brewers and Minnesota Twins next season after Diamond Sports Group chose not to renew its contracts with each of those teams.
In a release, MLB said that the household reach of Guardians games will increase by 235% in 2025 to 4.86 million homes. Twins games will now reach 4.40 million homes, an increase of 307%.
The expanded reach is owed to the disappearance of blackouts as MLB is producing and broadcasting the games instead of regional sports networks and making them available through direct-to-consumer streaming, which means they’re not subject to regional blackouts.
The Brewers already had a direct-to-consumer streaming option available to fans, which MLB will continue to offer. The league will develop direct-to-consumer streaming options for the Guardians and Twins.
MLB was not expecting Diamond Sports Group, which is currently in bankruptcy proceedings, to drop any teams, let alone so many teams at once. But DSG announced Oct. 2 that it would not be renewing the contracts of the Twins, Brewers, Guardians and Texas Rangers, which all expired at the end of the 2024 season. DSG rejected the contracts of two other teams, the Detroit Tigers and Tampa Bay Rays, and implied that the contracts of five more teams, all of which expire in 2025, will need to be renegotiated.
While MLB may not have planned to produce and broadcast local games for the Brewers, Twins and Guardians next year, it’s not a new arrangement for the league. MLB arranged cable and satellite deals broadcast local games for the Colorado Rockies, Arizona Diamondbacks and San Diego Padres. They also developed direct-to-consumer streaming options for each team.
The Rangers will not have their games produced or broadcast by MLB next year, but they also no longer want to partner with Diamond Sports Group. They are “considering their local media options for the 2025 season,” according to MLB.
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