On sports media: Will Twins.TV be available on cable and satellite when Opening Day arrives?
Twins.TV will make its debut on Sunday —you can watch the game for free via the direct-to-consumer option — but MLB is still negotiating with operators such as Comcast, Charter and DirecTV.
Don’t bother scanning your cable or satellite channels Sunday afternoon trying to find the first game on Twins.TV. Major League Baseball, which is handling negotiations with providers, has yet to strike carriage deals and it likely will go down to the wire for the Twins’ opener in St. Louis on March 27.
That doesn’t mean you won’t be able to watch Sunday’s game. You can stream it on Twins.TV or MLB.TV with Cory Provus and Justin Morneau on the call.
It will be the first of five spring training games produced by the Twins.TV crew and all will be free. After that you can buy the full season through the direct-to-consumer option for $99.99 or pay $19.99 a month.
The Twins announced after last season that they would be leaving FanDuel Sports Network to partner with MLB on forming Twins.TV. The drawback is the team will rely on subscriptions for much of its television revenue and no longer will receive a check for its rights. That means a significant cut in income from media rights.
What the Twins no longer will have to worry about are blackout restrictions that made their games unavailable to stream for those who didn’t get FanDuel and for many in Iowa, North Dakota, South Dakota and western Wisconsin.
The issue is that there are many fans who likely have little interest in adding another streaming service and already pay a significant amount for cable or satellite in part to spend spring and summer nights watching the Twins.
The Twins and Cleveland joined Arizona, Colorado and San Diego in agreeing to partner with MLB for the production of their games. This puts MLB in charge of negotiations for carriage at the national level for all five teams.
Negotiations involving the Twins are ongoing with all major cable and satellite providers, including Comcast, Charter, DirecTV, Fubo and others. Comcast is the largest cable operator in Minnesota. Dish Network has gotten out of the sports business so it’s not involved.
How long could this take?
Last season, the Rockies announced agreements with various cable systems, including Comcast, and DirecTV on the morning of their opener in Arizona. The Diamondbacks and Padres also made announcements in late March.
Because all of those deals got done late sources said there’s a high level of confidence the Twins will be available on major systems near Opening Day.
This isn’t like when the Twins' failed to get carriage for Victory Sports in 2004 and ended up going back to Fox Sports North (which is now FanDuel) after the first month of the season. Twins.TV isn’t a 24-hour regional sports network and its sole purpose will be to carry Twins games. The Twins also handled those negotiations and had little leverage at the national level.
MLB Media also is expected to negotiate to get a package of Twins games on over-the-air (or free) television this season. The Twins haven’t had this type of agreement since Ch. 29 aired select games in 2010. This makes sense given the reason the Twins left over-the-air was because it added value to their deal with Fox Sports North. The Twins want to get as many direct-to-consumer subs as possible but the most important thing is making sure fans can watch them.