Oh, is somebody upset that they didn’t get in on the Friday news dump stadium subsidy action? Fine, you in the back there, Arizona Diamondbacks owner Ken Kendrick:
Diamondbacks Managing General Partner Ken Kendrick expressed disappointment over his organization’s inability to secure public funding to renovate Chase Field, suggesting that despite a desire to remain in Arizona the club could eventually look to move elsewhere if an agreement cannot be reached.
“We may run out of time in Phoenix,” Kendrick said. “We hope that won’t happen.”
So where is Kendrick threatening to move to exactly? To a neighboring city, or outside of the Phoenix region entirely?
Kendrick said he was not trying to issue a threat to the state about moving, saying multiple times the Diamondbacks were not currently engaged in discussions with other markets about leaving town…
Kendrick added: “I don’t think, in the world that we live in, threats are the right way to do business.”
Oh, okay, not a threat, got it—
“Cities are letting MLB know their interest; their interest in getting a team is specific. They would be happy with a brand new franchise, but they would certainly be very happy, you know, with, frankly, a successful, existing franchise.”
It’d be a terrible thing if someone was to set fire to the Diamondbacks, wouldn’t it, Colonel?
While talk of the Diamondbacks relocating to one of the cities seeking an MLB expansion team is a new twist, talk of shopping the team around isn’t particularly: D-Backs CEO Derrick Hall said last spring training that team execs were “looking at what other options might be in Maricopa County … and there’s been some interested parties.” (But not actually engaging in discussions with the interested parties, presumably, just looking at them longingly across the room.) It’s still not clear whether Kendrick and Hall are looking to get a new stadium or renovations to their existing one, or how much money it would cost or how much they want the public to kick in, or really anything beyond “give us what we want, or else.” No, wait, not “or else,” that sounds threat-y. “Give us what we want, and nobody gets hurt”? Note to self: Keep workshopping this.
The Sun’s got 2 renovations of the Footprint Center, but the Cardinals haven’t gotten a renovation of State Farm Stadium and the Coyotes got the boot. If the Diamondbacks want to leave the fifth largest city in the country, the 4th largest county, 3 miles from the 7th busiest airport and fast growing downtown Phoenix, let them.
They also don’t have a local tv deal. D-Backs are kind of the canary in a coal mine when it comes to the future of the MLB. I think we are nearing the “post market” era. Unless you’re the Yankees, Dodgers your local tv will basically worthless. Streaming might be the future- but how many D-backs fans will pay for a subscription?
While the MLB is unlikely to give up on Florida or Arizona, the fact that a large % of rich white people dont spend their summers in these places is a major issue.
The Rockies just launched a standalone streaming service to watch all games for $100 a year. Not sure how it’s selling, but that could be a viable alternative for people who want to ditch cable.
See! John Fisher has started a trend. Just because he doesn’t fully understand it, don’t expect other owners not to jump on the bandwagon of doom…
vis: the streaming/RSN rights, what Neil is suggesting would seem to be a viable model.
Someone has to own those rights. If it is MLB itself, then it will sell them and dole out the proceeds on some sort of formula that fairly compensates small markets while also sharing some of the wealth from large markets. Last time I checked MLBtv was available for around $100 too, but you don’t get in market games. This is a bigger problem in some markets than others.
If it is the individual teams that will own streaming rights (like RSN rights), then you would expect something along the lines of the league compensating teams for “offering” their regional games nationally when desired or a simple pooled revenue system that has everyone paying a percentage of revenues into a fund and receiving an equal (or pro rated) payout at the end of the month/season.
I’m sure the MLB tall foreheads (insert Manfred joke here) are having highly contentious discussions as we speak, and that these will go on for some time. One thing is clear, however, and it’s that they can’t simply allow teams to sell their streaming rights individually going forward without some form of equalization. It would make the revenue disparity we see now much, much worse than it has ever been.
The Yankees local cable revenues in the 1980s generated more revenue than most of the other teams TOTAL revenues. And that’s when the Yankees were pretty awful.
No sports league is ever going to ‘solve’ the problem of a high value market being able to generate more revenue in their local market than other teams can generate in total, but there are ways to minimize the impact. The NFL does it. The NHL is trying. MLB is a bit behind the curve on this one.
“One thing is clear, however, and it’s that they can’t simply allow teams to sell their streaming rights individually going forward without some form of equalization. It would make the revenue disparity we see now much, much worse than it has ever been.”
I suspect you’ve confused “can’t” with “shouldn’t.” Because it sure seems like this is the path Manfred is taking, at least for now, and it’s going to be nearly impossible to get the genie back in that bottle.
I don’t know that I would agree that that “IS” the path Manfred is taking. I think it’s the one some of his employers would like… but then again, who among the major revenue generators wouldn’t?
We’ll see if he can make something workable out of this (we only have five more years to kick him around… unless his employers beg him to stay, of course…).
I would only suggest that him working a deal that allows teams to individually sell their streaming rights is not the same as having them pocket all the revenue from same. I’m sure the top six or eight revenue generators will want to do just that. But the other voting block will see it as ‘less than ideal’ or maybe even unacceptable.
The likely solution would be each team paying a percentage of their streaming revenues into a pool that is distributed equally among all teams (the streaming version of the visitor’s gate share).
The question will be what percentage that is…
I would guess that small market teams will feel that it is only right that they pay 50% into the pool… after all, you need two teams to have a game… while the top six will be thinking more like “10%”.
From last April:
As an alternative, could MLB force the clubs — say, through a three-quarters vote among the 30 owners — to pool their in-market digital rights together? Manfred declined to answer that question when approached by The Athletic, but suggested that any pooling would likely be done voluntarily, rather than by force.
“Look, that’s a legal question and I don’t really feel comfortable answering,” Manfred said. “The reality is, I think any significant reform of the economics happens in some sort of consensual — if it were to happen, it would happen in a consensual process. But I’m not answering the legal question as to what’s possible.”
https://theathletic.com/4409306/2023/04/14/mlb-streaming-tv-blackouts/?source=emp_shared_article
The Yankees are not going to “consensually” agree to share their local streaming revenue. So unless Manfred was being coy and there will be arm-twisting behind the scenes, at most what you’ll see is the big-market teams each running their own local streaming services, while everyone else is pooled into one big MLB.tv+. Which Manfred has hinted at as well:
https://www.sportspromedia.com/news/mlb-streaming-service-ballys-dsg-rob-manfred/
The Yankees don’t want to pay anything into revenue sharing either. Yet – one way or another – they do.
The national broadcast deal(s) cover all 30 teams despite the fact that it is mainly a dozen or so teams that get featured week in week out. And the national tv deals have superseded the locals for most of MLBs “television” history.
There’s no reason that streaming could not be managed the same way (and that is just one option of many).
Manfred may or may not be the guy who can take a hard line with the owners of the half dozen franchises that could truly make out like bandits on streaming (the same way they do on other fronts), but he has no choice but to try.
The “Greensboro Diamondbacks” has a nice ring to it…
How about Greensboro Copperheads?
Greensboro Greenbacks???
It has gotten to a point where common fans can’t go anyway. Tickets, concessions, parking, a cap for the kids= house payment, groceries, paying for important items, etc. fans need to say enough! I’ll spend any extra money I might have left over on another form of entertainment. MOVE!!!!! BYE!!!!
I’m confused… what do they want from Phoenix?
I try to follow these stories closely and usually there’s a step where they want stadium renovations or a new ballpark, but I never saw a report of them complaining about the problems with Chase field.
Is this like the Atlanta Braves where they want to get away from the urban part of the metro and go to a more affluent suburban area where they can develop real estate?
Do they want renovations of Chase Field? What the hell is there to renovate- marble concourses and gold bathroom fixtures?
Do they want a better TV deal?
Are they unhappy with attendance?
Or are they just starting with “not threats” to see what panicky politicians will throw at them?
“If our roof got stuck or the a/c stopped working, MLB might make us move to Vancouver.”
I swear I am not making this up:
https://www.fieldofschemes.com/2020/02/26/15804/d-backs-execs-visited-vancouver-as-relocation-threat-maybe-sometime-stop-the-presses/
https://www.fieldofschemes.com/2017/08/02/12741/d-backs-lawyer-if-our-stadium-ac-keeps-leaking-mlb-could-force-the-team-to-leave-arizona/