Atlanta Braves Saturday Chop: News catch-up time

While there still isn’t a lot of ‘momentum’ toward any on-field baseball deals, the business of baseball does continue to march along.

The MLB Owner’s Meetings took place this week, hosted by your Atlanta Braves at SunTrust Park.  During that event and further around baseball this week, there were a few noteworthy pieces of information to pass along.

There will be more money pumped into the sport…but not quite yet.  There were many reports about Major League Baseball’s new network contract with FOX that effectively extends a deal already in place.

The pact will run for 7 years at a rate of $715 million per season – an increase of 36.2% over today’s rates.  That’s over $5 billion dollars total.

What you aren’t hearing much about in these reports is that this isn’t happening immediately.  The current contract has not yet expired and still has 3 more seasons to run.

So here’s the breakdown:

• 2019-2021:  $525 million annually ($17.3 million per team)
• 2022-2028:  $715 million annually ($23.8 million per team)

The net is roughly $6.5 million extra per team:  it’s not a panacea for the markets, but every ‘little bit’ (if you want to think of $6.5 million dollars in those terms) helps.

In 2014, the Braves successfully navigated some negotiations with FOXSports to rework its own one-sided TV deal.  Originally, that deal ran through 2027, but is almost certainly extended – though the length has not been disclosed.  Still, that has resulted in more significant additional revenue for the Braves as well.