Another streaming option has opened up for baseball fans supporting the three teams aired by the NBC Sports regional networks.
Major League Baseball announced on Wednesday that in-market fans of the Athletics, San Francisco Giants, and Philadelphia Phillies can purchase team-specific streaming packages through MLB.tv. This is in addition to an announcement earlier this week that made NBC Sports regional networks available as an add-on through Peacock for fans living in those markets.
Packages the A’s and Giants will run subscribers $19.99 monthly, while Phillies fans will be charged $24.99 monthly for their team. For an additional $20 per month, fans can bundle this subscription with MLB.tv’s out-of-market games.
The price is slightly higher than the Peacock add-ons announced earlier this week, which clocked in at $17.95 monthly for A’s and Giants fans and $24.95 per month for the Phillies. Of course, the Peacock add-on requires one to be subscribed to Peacock already, which is an additional cost. However, the add-on provides complete access to all of the NBC Sports regional networks’ programming rather than just one MLB team.
So, for instance, someone who purchases the NBC Sports Bay Area add-on for Peacock will get access to Giants and Golden State Warriors games, while someone who simply purchases the MLB.tv subscription will only get Giants games. It should be noted that the MLB.tv subscription also includes pregame and postgame coverage.
Semantics aside, this announcement provides another option for fans of these MLB clubs. Gone are the days when one needed a paid TV subscription to watch baseball. Now, 26 out of 30 MLB teams have a direct-to-consumer option for in-market fans.
In total, 13 MLB franchises have added a direct-to-consumer option this offseason. In addition to the three aforementioned teams, the Atlanta Braves, Chicago White Sox, Cincinnati Reds, Cleveland Guardians, Los Angeles Angels, Los Angeles Dodgers, Minnesota Twins, New York Mets, St. Louis Cardinals and Texas Rangers have also added streaming options for this season.
