The 2022 MLS TV thread

The Sports Business Journal clarified the USSF cut as $25m yr and stated MLS was receiving $65m yr from US rights. The Athletic stated in their article/tweets total rights fees totaled $105m yr the Canadian/Int'l rights =$15m yr. So MLS in total was getting $80myr divided by 20-28 clubs thru the past deal.

 

Ditto. The visuals on the ballgames are stellar, but the announcers are flat-out painful to listen to. Make that same mistake with soccer and they'll kill us dead.

There's been a lot of feedback along those lines, though. It's not like Garber and the MLS executive suite to miss something like that, either. So hopefully they have a handle on it.

 

Does Apple themselves produce the MLB games? With MLS producing these broadcasts and supplying them to Apple, one would hope they would avoid such problems.

 

I'd say one big positive potentially is the picture quality of the games. There are still so many awful mls broadcasts when it comes to picture quality even including games on the big partners. I've watched a few Apple TV MLB games and while the PBP team has sometimes been awful the picture quality has been superb.

Edit - I see others beat me to that comment.

 

Ahhh, great point that I didn't consider.

 

I was rooting for Paramount+. I really like their coverage of soccer in general. I've started getting into the Argentine LPF just because it's there and they did a fantastic job of covering the Champions/Europa/Europa Conference leagues. My dream scenario was NHL, Bundesliga, and MLS going to CBS.

 

Apple is handling all of it, I believe. The graphics/stats are theirs and they hired the announce teams (Katie Nolan is a lot of things, but a good announcer isn't one of them).

 

Agreed and I like your analogy. Did MLS sign with a big name for more money but won't get the exposure and that will hurt their prospects in the long run (Steffen at Man City) or should they have signed for less with a place that will give them more exposure now to grow their numbers (Robinson to Fulham instead of AC Milan [good] or Sargent to Norwich, Pepi to Augsburg [not so good]).

No perfect analogies of course, but I think they are parallel ideas. Not sure what the right answer is, and we won't know for a while.

 

What’s “free” on Apple TV? Everything that’s labeled for free tells me to connect other apps. You know, where I’ve already paid for the content.

Thx,

Jay!

 

Apple TV is just an ecosystem where you can buy access to different services. Apple TV+ is one of those services. MLS will be a second.

 

The way I’m reading it, the new MLS “channel” will require a subscription just like all those other things. But it also seems that some “select” games will be available to AppleTV+ subscribers.

So if you want to watch all games from a specific team, you should subscribe to the channel to guarantee you have access. But if you just subscribe to AppleTV+ you will probably be able to watch a game or two each week, but not necessarily the one you care about the most.

 

What it sounds like, to me, is that MLS is doing something similar to the NFL Network but with the ability to watch every game there as well. The Apple release talks about "highlights, analysis, and other original programming" as well as "in-depth, behind the scenes views of the players and clubs". It also will include the Leagues Cup and Campeones Cup from the start. I also wouldn't be surprised if they made a play for the CCL since I think that still doesn't have an English rights deal for next year yet.

 

Thanks for the clarifications. As someone who hasn't even peeked at Apple offerings in the last few years, this updated my perspective.

 

And a limited number of games will be available to anyone who goes to Apple TV, even if you don't subscribe to Apple TV+ or MLS+ (working title...)

MLS+ All games, whiparound show, some MLS Next Pro, some MLS Next
Apple TV+ "a broad selection"
Apple TV "a limited number"

 

Sorry about that. Have a full piece coming out soon that will clarify all of it.

Basically, you don't need to subscribe to Apple TV+ to subscribe to the MLS streaming service within Apple TV.

— Sam Stejskal (@samstejskal) June 14, 2022

 

I think what people are confusing here is what this deal is for. MLS just sold the streaming portion of their rights for 250 million, whereas they sold those rights along with tv rights to ESPN and Fox for 75 million a year (when ESPN took that over I don't think they actually paid MLS any more than that). They are still likely selling TV rights for national TV games as well, so they will still get roughly the same amount of exposure nationally as they did before. ESPN apparently wasn't that interested (or interested at all) in the streaming rights and who knows if other platforms would be willing to let MLS do what it seems they are trying to do with the channel. And since it is going to just be a subscription service anyway, I doubt that it really matters if they ended up on Amazon, Netflix, or anywhere else. The draw of the channel would be roughly the same.

Now, locally, it might be a different story. The writing has been on the wall for that for a few years though. I feel like they knew that whoever got the whole streaming service wouldn't want the local feeds going out.

 

You might be right that MLS's streaming numbers would be roughly the same no matter which streaming service they landed on (Para+, Amazon, etc.). It will be very interesting to see what kind of money MLS gets from an ESPN to put some games on (ABC, ESPN, ESPN2) when those games are also being streamed by Apple. For lets say 25-30 games, does that get <$10mil a year or is it >$25m? Or somewhere in between? I don't know the answer and I don't know that there is a good comparable to which to benchmark this.

I am super curious to learn the remaining details.

- How much will MLS+ cost?
- How many games will be free (Apple TV)? On Apple TV+? On cable TV/OTA?
- How much will MLS get for cable TV/OTA rights that are not exclusive? (Would some of that money have to go to Apple to comp them for the games not being Apple exclusive?)

I agree that folks that got the majority of their MLS coverage via their RSN will like this deal the least as they'll have to subscribe to MLS+ to guarantee the ability to see their team. Of course, if MLS was the only reason they had cable, they can cancel that and MLS+ will (probably) be cheaper.

 

Details on MLS' 10-year, $2.5 billion deal w/ Apple with @samstejskal:

✔️Apple will show every match
✔️Deals still likely w/ ESPN, Univision
✔️No more local broadcasts
✔️Don't need Apple TV+ to watch
✔️Apple, ESPN may rotate MLS Cuphttps://t.co/WQEhqPD99p pic.twitter.com/h9KfQel8wx

— Paul Tenorio (@PaulTenorio) June 14, 2022

 

Surely simulcasting TV commentary would mean long periods of silence.

NYCFC has had their own radio commentary which was broadcast locally but is now only available on tunein.

It would be a shame not to be able to watch USL. USL's ESPN contract runs through 2024.

 

Biggest question surely is will Apple TV+ be available on Android?

Apologies if this has already been asked.

 

Via web browser, but not a native app.

 

They also got 15 million for foreign rights fees and I believe.

 

Yuck. Big negative for me.