Bankrupt regional sports network operator Diamond Sports Group introduced three separate legal motions Friday indicating that it has reached deals through mediation with Major League Baseball's Cleveland Guardians, Minnesota Twins and Texas Rangers to keep the teams' games on Bally Sports channels through the upcoming 2024 season.
With the agreements, Diamond, a Sinclair Broadcast Group subsidiary formed back in 2019 after Sinclair's ill-fated $10.6 billion purchase of the Fox SportsNet regional sports networks, now has clarity on how it will proceed with its most volatile sports league relationship, the one with Major League Baseball.
Twelve MLB teams will appear on Bally Sports linear channels when the 2024 season starts on March 28. At the end of the season, the clubs' local telecast rights revert back to MLB.
Diamond had already forged agreements with the other nine MLB clubs to move forward through 2024 back in December, with the Twins, Guardians and defending World Series Champions Rangers still in limbo. While providing immediate clarity on those three teams, Friday's three bankruptcy court motions do not, however, specify as to whether the Rangers, Twins and Guardians also gave Diamond their direct-to-consumer rights.
Diamond, which finally announced a restructuring plan back on January 17 after 10 months in bankruptcy, had already carved out similar short-term deals with its other league partners, the NBA and NHL, to carry through the rest of the ongoing 2023-24 pro basketball and hockey seasons.
Also read: Diamond and NHL Forge Deal to Skate Through Current Season
Terms of the mediated agreements with the Rangers, Twins and Guardians were not precisely specified, but each team agreed to reduce its contracted local TV rights fee. Again, the teams, like all other clubs under the Bally Sports umbrella now, will be free to negotiate new local TV arrangements after this year.
Each of the three bankruptcy-court motions filed by Diamond Friday includes this language: "The Amendment provides for rights fee modifications and truncates the term of the Telecast Rights Agreement so that it will terminate automatically at the conclusion of the 2024 MLB season."
Diamond's restructuring includes a $115 million minority investment from Amazon, which wants to distribute MLB games shown on Diamond's direct-to-consumer streaming platform, Bally Sports Plus, through Amazon Prime Video Channels.
Regarding DTC distribution, Friday's filings include only this language: "A commitment that the Guardians [as well as the Twins and Rangers] will not, during the term of the Telecast Rights Agreement, distribute or authorize the distribution by any other party of, on a direct-to-consumer basis within the applicable territory, games and programming delivered to the Debtors pursuant to the Telecast Rights Agreement.
It has been reported that MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred wants to negotiate DTC rights with Amazon without Diamond involved. At least for 2024, the agreements with the Rangers, Twins and Guardians would seem to preclude that option, at least for those teams.
Also read: Amid Diamond’s Apparent Detente With MLB, Twins Return to Bally Sports Remains Doubtful
The Rangers and Guardians were still under contract with Diamond, but the Twins' Bally Sports deal expired Oct. 1 following the conclusion of the 2023 MLB regular season.
Back in mid-December, a Bally Sports insider told us wasn't "overly optimistic" at the time that the Twins would be back in the fold.
As for Diamond, it's restructuring included not only forging short-term deals with the leagues and pay TV operators to carry it through the 2024 baseball season, but the subsidiary also made peace with Sinclair, after it accused its estranged parent company of "milking" it of funds over the past several years.
