@mjp28 said:

So what's next ?

★ NOTE :  I SAW THIS FROM BALLY AT 2 PM  SATURDAY APRIL 1, 2023  -  NO JOKE.   

Friday, Mar 31, 2023 02:28 PM.  

 ︎ How to watch Cleveland Guardians telecasts

Bally Sports Great Lakes, the television home of the Guardians, will televise select spring training games in 2023 and all regular season games not selected for exclusive national broadcast.

★ How do I get Bally Sports Great Lakes?

Bally Sports Great Lakes is widely available on cable, satellite, and streaming providers throughout the region. Visit www.getmyhometeams.com for options in your zip code.

How can I stream Bally Sports Great Lakes’ Guardians coverage?

Bally Sports Great Lakes’ Guardians coverage is available on DirecTV Stream and Fubo TV. Fans can also stream Bally Sports Great Lakes’ Guardians coverage on the Bally Sports app and BallySports.com as part of their pay-TV subscription by authenticating with their cable, satellite, or streaming provider credentials. Simply sign into the app using the pay-TV user ID and password.

Are the Guardians available on Bally Sports Plus? No, not at this time.

Where can I find streaming technical support? Visit http://help.ballysports.com or call 1-866-Bally01 (1-866-225-5901).

★  In what areas are Guardians games televised on Bally Sports Great Lakes? ★  Guardians regional TV territory, as defined by MLB, is northern and central Ohio, western Pennsylvania and portions of western New York.

How do I watch the Guardians if I live outside the Guardians regional TV territory? MLB designates geographic territories to which each team can show its regionally televised games. Guardians fans outside of the Guardians regional TV territory can subscribe to MLB’s out-of-market packages, MLB.TV or MLB Extra Innings, to view games

 

TV Answer Man, I would like to cut cable and get Bally Sports Plus to watch my team, the Cleveland Guardians. But I know Bally may be bankrupt soon. Will that stop Bally Sports Plus from adding the Guardians before the season? — Jim, Cleveland.

Jim, the regional sports network crisis has many fans confused with Bally Sports’ operating unit, Diamond Sports, possibly declaring bankruptcy later this month and Warner Bros Discovery threatening to stop broadcasting games on their AT&T-named RSNs by the end of March.

But let’s examine how a Diamond Sports bankruptcy could affect Bally Sports Plus.

Bally Sports Plus, which costs $19.99 a month or $189.99 a year, streams the live games of 16 NBA and 12 NHL teams, but it has only secured the streaming rights to five MLB teams thus far. They are the Detroit Tigers, Kansas City Royals, Miami Marlins, Milwaukee Brewers and the Tampa Bay Rays.

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Sinclair Broadcasting, which owns Diamond, has frequently expressed hope that it will add more teams before the 2023 MLB season. (The nine teams that Sinclair/Diamond has not secured deals with are: Atlanta Braves, Cleveland Guardians, San Diego Padres, Arizona Diamondbacks, Cincinnati Reds, Texas Rangers, Minnesota Twins, St. Louis Cardinals, and Los Angeles Angels.)

However, with bankruptcy looming, it’s difficult to envision a scenario where more MLB teams will agree to sell its rights to Diamond Sports before the season starts on March 30. Diamond seems interested in continuing the Bally Sports broadcasts but under a new financial arrangement with its creditors, including the leagues and their teams. The missing MLB teams would probably want to wait to see what Diamond has planned before moving forward with Bally Sports Plus.

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In addition, MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred has suggested the league could take back Bally’s broadcasting rights if Diamond misses a payment due to a bankruptcy filing.

Bottom line: The situation is too uncertain at this time for one of the nine missing MLB teams to make a deal with Diamond.

Jim, hope that helps. Happy viewing and stay safe!

Diamond Sports Group, the Sinclair Broadcasting-owned subsidiary that operates Bally Sports Kansas City, skipped a $140 million interest payment last week, triggering a 30-day grace period that will almost certainly preface a bankruptcy filing. Diamond Sports owns and operates 19 Bally-branded regional sports networks (RSNs), 14 of which own the rights to broadcast MLB teams, plus a minority stake in two additional baseball RSNs in Marquee Sports for the Cubs and YES Network for the Yankees.

The potential bankruptcy filing for a company that purchased these networks for $10 billion in 2019 has sent shockwaves through the industry and has caused concern in baseball. Let’s talk about what’s going on and how it affects the Royals.

Why is Diamond Sports going bankrupt?

The first reaction from Royals fans about the potential bankruptcy of Diamond Sports might be “no kidding, ya knucklehead, you didn’t make games available to viewers!” Royals fans are no doubt frustrated over the company’s tough negotiating stance with streaming providers that led to Bally Sports Kansas City being dropped by YouTubeTV, SlingTV, and DISH Network.

It hasn’t helped that Diamond Sports has made it difficult to watch games, or that they bought these networks just before a pandemic, or that by one conservative estimate, cable is losing 5 percent of its customer base each year. Bally Sports did roll out a direct-to-consumer streaming option last summer for $19.99 per month. But baseball refused to transfer all of their streaming rights to Bally’s, and the service knowns as Bally Sports+ was only available in a few markets (including Kansas City).

Despite those obstacles, this was a profitable company in 2021 and 2022. As Ben Clemens from Fangraphs points out, “this bankruptcy has to do with debt service, not a catastrophic business failure.” Sinclair wanted to be a major broadcast player, so they took on $8.6 billion in debt to purchase the RSNs from Disney. The purchase boosted stock prices by 15 percent as CEO Chris Ripley dreamed of integrating sports gambling with their broadcasts. But the profits weren’t profitable enough. Diamond Sports - which was created to keep the RSNs at an arm’s length from Sinclair, perhaps an indication they knew how risky this endeavor would be - is too saddled with debt to dig out of their hole.   --> CONTINUED -->         I ALSO AM CHECKING MORE SOURCES.