ESPN Blackout?

[keepngoal]

First off, I am not a baseball fan ... 90% of the time I don't care about its existence. However, NOTHING is on TV and I saw a game on ESPN... Reds at the Cards, so I thought I would tune to watch.... something.

Blacked out. Yep, ESPN not ESPN2 is blacked out through DISH with Des Moines locals ....

I am surprised by this ... really surprised for ESPN.

-keep

[clone2011]

I don't know if they have FSN Midwest on Dish...but the game is on there on Mediacom. I figured it would probably be blacked out on ESPN but luckily FSN-M covers something like 120 St Louis games/year.

[keepngoal]

thanks.... after channel surfing... I found 'my' Royals on 442.

Still surprised on ESPN being blacked out.

[garn91]

First off, I am not a baseball fan ... 90% of the time I don't care about its existence. However, NOTHING is on TV and I saw a game on ESPN... Reds at the Cards, so I thought I would tune to watch.... something.

Blacked out. Yep, ESPN not ESPN2 is blacked out through DISH with Des Moines locals ....

I am surprised by this ... really surprised for ESPN.

-keep

ESPN has to black it out to protect the home TV broadcast as St. Louis claims all of Iowa has part of it's home TV market. ESPN is blacked out for me on DirecTV as well.

[SCNCY]

I'm not sure how these blackout rules are handeled, but I think ESPN doesn't control the blackout games, I think its an MLB issue.

[keepngoal]

St. Louis claims all of Iowa has part of it's home TV market, you'll find the game on FS Midwest.

thanks... even thought that doesn't make a LOT of sense, it answers the question.

-keep

[IcSyU]

thanks... even thought that doesn't make a LOT of sense, it answers the question.

-keep

Basically the Twins, Brewers, Cardinals, White Sox, Cubs, and Royals all claim that the state of Iowa is their home area. Because of this, most of their games are on local channels (FSN, Comcast, etc.) and therefore to protect their networks, any game televised nationally is blacked out because they want all revenue going to their network and not ESPN or TBS. MLB has the WORST blackout policy in the history of sports, and I don't see it changing any time in the near future.

[CloneState1028]

It's only blacked out, for me, if it IS on FSN-Midwest. If it's not on any other channel but ESPN, it's not blacked out.

[2020cy]

Basically the Twins, Brewers, Cardinals, White Sox, Cubs, and Royals all claim that the state of Iowa is their home area. Because of this, most of their games are on local channels (FSN, Comcast, etc.) and therefore to protect their networks, any game televised nationally is blacked out because they want all revenue going to their network and not ESPN or TBS. MLB has the WORST blackout policy in the history of sports, and I don't see it changing any time in the near future.

This is such a joke, for a state that has no pro teams, so we get blacked out by everybody. How many tv's are we really talking about here.

[theshadow]

I'm not sure how these blackout rules are handeled, but I think ESPN doesn't control the blackout games, I think its an MLB issue.

The only exclusive national broadcasts are ESPN Sunday night and Fox Saturday.

Everything else on ESPN (weeknight) or TBS (Sunday) is not exclusive. The teams' local stations get the home market areas, and the "national" network gets everything outside of it.

Since MLB's blackout rules come from 1960s-era territorial grabs, the state of Iowa gets the high hard one in the form of being the home market for SIX different teams.

[pyrocyz]

Des Moines is considered a home market for the following teams:

Royals
Twins
Brewers
Cubs
White Sox
Cardinals


if you are a fan of any of those teams you watch the national games if they are on ESPN or any other national broadcast and a "local" broadcast you will not see it on the national broadcast.

All MLB.tv games of those teams are also blacked out in this area.