Nationals games are coming to a new platform this season. The franchise announced Wednesday that its games would air on a new platform — Nationals.TV — produced in partnership with Major League Baseball.
Washington’s 162 regular-season matchups will be available to stream online through the league’s direct-to-consumer platform and will air on cable and satellite television for fans in the Washington region.
“Partnering with MLB offers us several new opportunities that will greatly improve the on-air product, including technological enhancements, the ability to work more closely with our broadcasters, and create added opportunities for our valued corporate partners,” Nationals owner Mark Lerner said in a statement.
The Nationals have not confirmed what channel the games will air on or which cable and satellite providers will carry the new network. That information will be released later, the franchise said.
The team confirmed that Nationals.TV streaming subscriptions could be purchased through the MLB’s website or app beginning in February.
The Nationals are the seventh team to partner with MLB for its local broadcast rights, a number that has grown over the last two years as regional sports networks struggle to stay afloat. All nine MLB clubs that were airing games through the FanDuel Sports Network cancelled their contracts earlier this month.
The Arizona Diamondbacks, Cleveland Guardians, San Diego Padres, Seattle Mariners, Colorado Rockies and Minnesota Twins had already announced plans to partner with MLB for local broadcasts this season.
The Nationals’ new, MLB-produced broadcasts will feature increased access and special elements like a “wire cam” and “shallow-depth” angles in right field, the league said.
The Nationals and MLB have not announced who would replace Bob Carpenter on broadcasts for the coming seasons. The longtime sportscaster spent 20 years as the television play-by-play voice of the Nationals before retiring at the end of last season.
The MLB partnership will replace the Nationals’ much-maligned deal with the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network, the regional sports entity primarily owned by the Baltimore Orioles.
MASN was established in March 2005 after the Montreal Expos relocated to Washington and became the Nationals, moving into what had been Baltimore’s exclusive broadcast territory since 1972. The Orioles were given a supermajority partnership interest in MASN, starting at 90%, and Washington made a $75 million payment to the network for an initial 10%.
The agreement called for the Nationals’ equity to increase 1% annually, starting after the 2009 season, with a cap of 33%. The network’s rights payments to each team were set at $20 million apiece in 2005 and 2006, rising to $25 million in 2007, with $1 million annual increases through 2011.
After that, the network was to pay fair market value and disputes over the Nationals’ rights were to be resolved by MLB’s Revenue Sharing Definitions Committee, a group of three MLB club officials. The RSDC started to hear the case in 2012 and lawsuits over the decision were filed two years later in New York Supreme Court.
Litigation over the 2012-16 fees resulted in a 2019 RSDC decision that valued them at $296.8 million. After arguments that went to the New York Court of Appeals, the sides agreed to a settlement in June 2023.
A 2023 RSDC decision held Washington was owed about $304.1 million by MASN for 2017-21, after an adjustment downward of almost $45.5 million for the pandemic-shortened 2020 season. That decision was confirmed in the New York Supreme Court.
Another RSDC decision in 2024 had awarded the Nationals approximately $320.5 million for 2022-26. The rights fee was set at about $72.8 million each for 2022 and ’23 — matching 2021 — and dropped to approximately $58.3 million annually from 2024-26, citing deteriorating economics of regional sports networks.
The Nationals reached an agreement with the Orioles and MASN in March that nullified the final year of the RSDC ruling and allowed Washington to find its own broadcast deal for the 2026 season.
• This article is based in part on wire service reports.
• Liam Griffin can be reached at lgriffin@washingtontimes.com.
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