Opening day Thursday could be the calm before the storm for Major League Baseball.
The collective bargaining agreement between the league and its players expires at the end of this season. The owners, with the support of the commissioner, will almost certainly push for a salary cap (which would likely come with a salary floor to get players to the negotiating table).
MLB owners have previously been unable to obtain caps passed by the Players Association. It’s unclear whether ending the 2026 season would result in a different outcome, but Bruce Meyer, interim executive director of the MLB Players Association, told ESPN last month that he expected a lockout to be “almost certain.”
In addition to the CBA expiration, there are also major changes underway regarding baseball media rights. Until this week, one-third of the league’s teams had not signed contracts with local TV stations for this season.
Nine MLB teams (Washington Nationals, Seattle Mariners, Milwaukee Brewers, St. Louis Cardinals, Miami Marlins, Tampa Bay Rays, Cincinnati Reds, Kansas City Royals, and Detroit Tigers) announced Wednesday that a new MLB-run team channel will be broadcast on DirecTV.
Most of these teams were previously part of Main Street Sports (formerly Diamond Sports Group), which operates FanDuel Sports Networks (formerly Bally Sports). The company has been reeling from liquidation, and the team terminated its contract with the company earlier this year for failing to make payments.
The 10th team, the Atlanta Braves, is launching a new network called BravesVision. with the Braves charters Spectrum announced a multi-year distribution agreement earlier this week.
Ideally, MLB would like to acquire the rights to all 30 of its teams by the end of the 2028 season so that it can sell in-market local games to streamers as national packages. It would be a modern alternative to regional sports networks, and perhaps a new, long-awaited package for streaming services like ESPN and Amazon Prime Video.
Also, at the end of the 2028 season, domestic media rights to all MLB packages will expire, allowing the league to redistribute games to partners or select new games.
NBC, ESPN, Fox, and the combination of CBS and Turner have dominated national ownership for the past several decades.
“The key to media negotiations right now is to make sure all rights are available,” MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred told me last year. “If all the content is available, all of the playoffs, all of the regular season, there will be a buyer. And I’m confident there will be a buyer at a higher price for us.”
Mr. Manfred floated the idea of expanding the league to 32 teams, reorganizing it geographically, and upending or even eliminating the American and National Leagues, which have existed for more than 100 years.
Rapid rise in TV ratings
Of course, it is unclear how much of this hypothetical change will actually materialize.
But the potential for change in MLB is greater than in the other four major American professional leagues.
Still, baseball isn’t struggling — far from it. The introduction of a pitch clock in 2023 led to shorter games, increased attendance, and improved television ratings.
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred attends the annual Allen & Company Sun Valley Media & Technology Conference at Sun Valley Resort on July 9, 2025 in Sun Valley, Idaho, USA.
David A. Grogan | CNBC
Game 7 of last year’s World Series was watched by more than 50 million people in the United States, Canada and Japan, making it the most-watched baseball game in 34 years. MLB recently concluded its global preseason tournament, the World Baseball Classic, with the final game drawing approximately 11 million viewers on FOX and Fox Deportes.
MLB team valuations have increased by 13% since last year. The average asset for an MLB team is now $2.95 billion, according to data from CNBC Sports.
Still, the league’s profitability is in far worse shape than the NFL, NBA and NHL, according to CNBC’s calculations. In 2025, MLB’s 30 teams had EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) margins of less than 2%. Teams had average revenue of $426 million and average EBITDA, including non-MLB ballpark events, of $7 million. By contrast, the NFL’s comparable margin was 20%. According to CNBC’s latest valuations, the NBA is at 21% and the NHL at 22%.
A new CBA taking over at the end of this season could be the first important step toward a completely different MLB. But like the WNBA, which announced a new CBA earlier this week, MLB must ensure that negotiations to obtain a new collective bargaining agreement do not jeopardize a wave of positive momentum.
