On Wednesday, Major League Baseball announced a slew of national media rights deals with ESPN, NBC Sports, and the streaming service Netflix.
These new deals, which run from the 2026 to the 2028 seasons, stem from the rights deals ESPN forfeited earlier this year with three years left to go, as well as a content deal previously held by Roku.
Here’s a look at the details:
ESPN
In addition to securing the rights to sell and distribute MLB.TV on the ESPN app, ESPN will now have a 30-game national package with matchups airing on its linear networks and its direct-to-consumer streaming service. In addition, beginning in 2026, it will have exclusive local in-market rights for six MLB teams: the Padres, Guardians, Mariners, Twins, Diamondbacks, and Rockies.
For subscribers to the ESPN Unlimited plan, the network will deliver more than 150 out-of-market MLB games each season across a special “game of the day” schedule.
ESPN remains the exclusive home of the MLB Little League Classic and now adds Memorial Day baseball and second-half opener games. However, it will lose its Sunday Night Baseball window, which it is ceding to NBC Sports after a 35-year run.
NBC Sports
The NBCUniversal-owned entity is growing its sports programming portfolio with the addition of this new media rights deal.
With the inheritance of Sunday Night Baseball, NBC Sports will also be the exclusive home of MLB Sunday Leadoff, Opening Day, Labor Day primetime games, and the entire postseason Wild Card Round, which will air across NBC, NBCSN, and Peacock.
The addition of Sunday Night Baseball to its schedule completes the loop of year-round live sports programming on Sunday night, which also includes Sunday Night Football and Sunday Night Basketball.
Also, NBC and Peacock will exclusively present all 15 MLB games on Sunday, July 5, 2026. The streaming service will stream a live Sunday afternoon whip-around show following MLB Sunday Leadoff, and live stream one out-of-market game daily. Finally, regular-season and postseason Peacock-exclusive MLB games will also be shown on NBCSN.
Netflix
The streaming giant will stream multiple live MLB events each year, including kicking off the season with a singular game on opening night, the evening before a full slate of traditional Opening Day matchups. It will also air the T-Mobile Home Run Derby, as well as an additional special-event game each year, starting with MLB at Field of Dreams in 2026.
This new rights announcement comes on the heels of MLB’s news that Netflix would be the league’s exclusive media rights partner in Japan for the 2026 World Baseball Classic.
