Senator Schmitt Questions Major League Baseball Executive on Missourians’ Access to Sports Broadcasts

WASHINGTON – Senator Schmitt earlier today questioned Major League Baseball’s Executive Vice President of Media and Business Development at a Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, & Transportation Hearing on Missourians access to sports broadcasts and the future of watching live sporting events:

Watch the Senator’s full remarks HERE.

Senator Eric Schmitt– “When I was a kid, growing up in the 80s, the only game… you could listen on the radio, but the only game you could maybe pick up was the NBC Game of the Week with…Vin Scully and St Louis and Joe Garagiola broadcasting those games. And then, you know, there was a time where the thinking was the more games you broadcast, maybe people wouldn’t actually go attend the games. And of course, that wasn’t true. And then you get into the regional sports networks. ESPN starts broadcasting more games. St Louis and Kansas City have some of the highest ratings when the regional sports networks existed, and now we’re in this new phase… I would only during baseball season, when I cut the cord, actually buy the cable subscription, which was really expensive, just to see the Cardinal games when I was at home. And we gravitated, you know, at first I had Sling because they carried the Cardinals. Then it went to YouTube TV because they had the Cardinals, and then they didn’t have the Cardinals. So it’s been a journey for a lot of fans… I just wanted to ask you, where is all this headed? Because people want to see the games.”

MLB Executive Vice President of Media and Business Development Kenny Gersh- “Where this is going is a great question. And I think, as the Commissioner has stated, he is looking to get to a more national product. I think we would like to see more of our games available more broadly, more nationally, and then kind of have one place where fans know to go to watch their games that aren’t being broadcast nationally. And so as we look to the next couple of years, our main rights deals come up after the 2028 season, that’s what we’re looking to achieve, is a place where there’s a whether it’s a national streaming package or MLB Network, becomes the home of local baseball, but where there’s one place that you go to know where your games are that aren’t being broadcast nationally.”

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