Karl Ravech ‘very optimistic about ESPN and Major League Baseball’s future’

Does Major League Baseball have a future on ESPN after the 2025 season? Karl Ravech, the voice of ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball telecasts, isn’t giving up hope.

It was revealed in February that MLB and ESPN had mutually agreed to not renew their deal after the 2025 season, a move that had been brewing for a while. But on Monday, Ravech discussed the possibility of a new agreement being reached.

“There are very smart people that are trying to figure out ways to move forward with Major League Baseball,” he said in a media call with Mollie Cahillane of Sports Business Journal. “That’s way above my pay grade to negotiate that, but I’m very optimistic about ESPN and Major League Baseball’s future.”

Talks between ESPN and MLB have continued since the split was announced — and there’s every reason to believe they will continue. That said, MLB has no shortage of interested suitors.

A large part of what made the split between ESPN and MLB feel inevitable was the network’s shift in coverage. Major League Baseball is often not a topic of conversation on shows like First Take and when it is, it’s notable — just not necessarily for the right reasons.

But despite that, Ravech believes that ESPN’s Major League Baseball coverage is better than nearly any other network’s.

“Who else provides any more coverage of baseball — with the exception of MLB Network — than ESPN does?” Ravech asked. “I’m just optimistic because of the platform that ESPN is and will be with ‘Flagship.’ When you think about the entities that are [going to be] on that ‘Flagship’ … I don’t want to say it requires, but my goodness — if you’re a sports fan, you’re going to want to have [baseball].”