Monday Night Baseball

Last updated
Monday Night Baseball
ABCMondayNightBaseball1987.jpg
ABC's Monday Night Baseball logo from 1987-1988.
Starring Karl Ravech
Dave Flemming
Eduardo Pérez
Tim Kurkjian
Country of originUnited States
No. of seasons17
Production
Running time3 hours (approximate)
Original release
Network NBC
ReleaseMay 30, 1966 (1966-05-30) –
September 1, 1975 (1975-09-01)
Network ABC
ReleaseApril 12, 1976 (1976-04-12) –
August 1, 1988 (1988-08-01)
Network ESPN
ReleaseApril 13, 1992 (1992-04-13) –
August 30, 2021 (2021-08-30)
Related
Sunday Night Baseball
Wednesday Night Baseball

Monday Night Baseball was an American live game telecast of Major League Baseball (MLB) that aired on Monday nights during the regular season.

Contents

Earlier incarnations of Monday Night Baseball aired on NBC and then ABC in the 1970s and 1980s.

These games formerly aired weekly on ESPN. The game started at 7 p.m. ET, following SportsCenter , and usually lasted around three hours leading up to an hour-long Baseball Tonight . The program sometimes aired on ESPN2 rather than ESPN, often due to NBA playoff coverage in April and May, and preseason Monday Night Football coverage in August.

Beginning with the 2022 Major League Baseball season, ESPN significantly reduced their MLB schedule, which included cutting their Monday Night Baseball games. Monday night games now occasionally air on Fox Sports 1 as part of their irregularly scheduled weeknight games, and on and MLB Network as part of their MLB Network Showcase package.

History

The NBC years (1966–1975)

Monday Night Baseball was born on October 19, 1966, when NBC signed a three-year contract to televise the game. Under the deal, NBC paid roughly $6 million per year for the 25 Games of the Week, $6.1 million for the 1967 World Series and 1967 All-Star Game, and $6.5 million for the 1968 World Series and 1968 All-Star Game. This brought the total value of the contract (which included three Monday night telecasts each season) up to $30.6 million.

From 1972 – 1975 NBC televised Monday games under a contract worth $72 million. [1] In 1973, NBC extended the Monday night telecasts to 15 straight (with a local blackout). September 1, 1975 saw NBC's last Monday Night Baseball game, in which the Montréal Expos beat the Philadelphia Phillies 6–5.

Curt Gowdy called the Monday night games with Tony Kubek from 1972 to 1974, the pair being joined in 1973 and 1974 by various guest commentators from both in and out of the baseball world. Jim Simpson and Maury Wills called the secondary backup games. Joe Garagiola hosted NBC's pregame show, The Baseball World of Joe Garagiola, and teamed with Gowdy to call the games in 1975.

The ABC years (1976–1988)

ABC would pick up the television rights for Monday Night Baseball [2] games in the following year. Just like with Monday Night Football , ABC brought in the concept of the three-man-booth (originally composed of Bob Prince, Bob Uecker, and Warner Wolf as the primary crew) to their baseball telecasts.

Ratings were typically poor for ABC's Monday night games, and by 1986, ABC only televised 13 Monday Night Baseball games. This was a fairly sharp contrast to the 18 games to that were scheduled in 1978. The Sporting News suggested that ABC paid Major League Baseball to not make them televise the regular season, opining that the network only wanted the sport for October anyway. For most of its time on ABC, the Monday night games were held on "dead travel days" when few games were scheduled. The team owners liked that arrangement, as the ABC games didn't compete against their stadium box offices and local telecasts. The network, on the other hand, found the arrangement far more complicated; ABC often had only one or two games to pick from for each telecast from a schedule designed by Major League Baseball. While trying to give all of the teams national exposure, ABC ended up with a surplus of games involving games between either small-market teams and/or teams with losing records.

In 1989, the final year of ABC's contract with Major League Baseball, ABC moved the baseball telecasts to Thursday nights in hopes of getting a leg up against NBC's The Cosby Show . The network also aired some late-season games on Sunday afternoons.

ESPN (2006–2021)

ESPN occasionally carried Monday night games after signing television rights deals with MLB in 1990, though the main regular broadcasts were Sunday Night Baseball and the Wednesday Night Baseball doubleheader. The network began carrying Monday night games regularly as part of the eight-year television contract that ESPN signed in 2005, replacing the second Wednesday night game. Unlike Sunday Night Baseball, the game was non-exclusive, meaning it would also be carried by the teams' local broadcasters, and telecasts were typically blacked out in the participating teams' markets. [3] [4] [5]

Because ESPN broadcasts Monday Night Football beginning with pre-season games in mid-August, late season Monday Night Baseball games would either move to ESPN2 or ESPN would broadcast a doubleheader as part of Wednesday Night Baseball. On some occasions, ESPN scheduled two games to air simultaneously, with one game airing on ESPN and the second on ESPN2. Both telecasts are branded with the Wednesday Night Baseball name, but one featured the Monday night announce team.

In 2021, ESPN agreed to a new contract with Major League Baseball through the 2028 season. However, the deal included only around 30 exclusive broadcasts, 25 of which would take place on Sunday Night Baseball, thus ending regular Monday Night Baseball broadcasts. [6] [7] [8] [9]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Major League Baseball on television</span> Overview of coverage of American professional baseball on television

Major League Baseball (MLB) has been broadcast on American television since the 1950s, with initial broadcasts on the experimental station W2XBS, the predecessor of the modern WNBC in New York. The World Series was televised on a networked basis since 1947, with regular season games broadcast nationally since 1953. Over the forthcoming years, MLB games became major attractions for American television networks, and each of the Big Three networks would air packages of baseball games at various times until the year 2000. Fox would rise to major network status, partially on its acquisition of MLB rights in 1996; Fox has been MLB's primary broadcast television partner ever since.

Wednesday Night Baseball was a live game telecast of Major League Baseball every Wednesday night during the regular season on ESPN that was broadcast from 1990 to 2021. Beginning with the 2022 Major League Baseball season, ESPN significantly reduced their MLB schedule, which included cutting most of their Wednesday Night Baseball games.

Major League Baseball on NBC is the de facto branding for weekly broadcasts of Major League Baseball (MLB) games that are produced by NBC Sports, and televised on the NBC television network; and, as of 2022, as well as on its co-owned streaming service, Peacock. Major League Baseball games first aired on the network from 1947 to 1989, including The NBC Game of the Week, when CBS acquired the broadcast television rights.

National television broadcasts of Major League Baseball (MLB) games have aired on ABC in various formats. The network first aired Saturday Major League Baseball Game of the Week games between 1953 and 1955, in 1960, and in 1965. ABC then televised MLB games from 1976 to 1989, airing Monday Night Baseball, Thursday Night Baseball, and Sunday Afternoon Baseball in various years during that period.

The Major League Baseball Game of the Week (GOTW) is the de facto title for nationally televised coverage of regular season Major League Baseball games. The Game of the Week has traditionally aired on Saturday afternoons. When the national networks began televising national games of the week, it opened the door for a national audience to see particular clubs. While most teams were broadcast, emphasis was always on the league leaders and the major market franchises that could draw the largest audience.

<i>Sunday Night Baseball</i> American live sports television program

Sunday Night Baseball is an exclusive weekly telecast of a Major League Baseball game that airs Sundays at 7 p.m. ET/4 p.m. PT on ESPN during the regular season.

<i>ESPN Major League Baseball</i> Promotion of Major League Baseball on ESPN

ESPN Major League Baseball is an American presentation of live Major League Baseball (MLB) games produced by ESPN. ESPN's MLB broadcasts have also aired on sister networks and platforms ESPN2, ABC and ESPN+.

In the United States, sports are televised on various broadcast networks, national and specialty sports cable channels, and regional sports networks. U.S. sports rights are estimated to be worth a total of $22.42 billion in 2019, about 44 percent of the total worldwide sports media market. U.S. networks are willing to pay a significant amount of money for television sports contracts because it attracts large amounts of viewership; live sport broadcasts accounted for 44 of the 50 list of most watched television broadcasts in the United States in 2016.

The National Hockey League has never fared as well on American television in comparison to the National Basketball Association, Major League Baseball, or the National Football League, although that has begun to change, with NBC's broadcasts of the final games of the 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2013 Stanley Cup Finals scoring some of the best ratings ever enjoyed by the sport on American television.

The history of the National Football League on television documents the long history of the National Football League on television. The NFL, along with boxing and professional wrestling, was a pioneer of sports broadcasting during a time when baseball and college football were more popular than professional football. Due to the NFL understanding television at an earlier time, they were able to surpass Major League Baseball in the 1960s as the most popular sport in the United States. Today, NFL broadcasting contracts are among the most valuable in the world.

<i>Thursday Night Baseball</i> US television program

Thursday Night Baseball is the de facto branding used for live game telecasts of Major League Baseball on Thursday nights.

In September 2000, Major League Baseball signed a six-year, $2.5 billion contract with Fox to show Saturday baseball, the All-Star Game, selected Division Series games and exclusive coverage of both League Championship Series and the World Series.

<i>Sunday Afternoon Baseball</i> Branding for MLB games held on Sunday afternoons

Sunday Afternoon Baseball is the de facto branding used for nationally televised live game telecasts of Major League Baseball games on Sunday afternoons during the regular season.

Tuesday Night Baseball is the de facto branding used for nationally televised live broadcasts of Major League Baseball (MLB) games in the United States on Tuesday evenings during the regular season.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on American sports broadcasting</span>

When the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, all major professional and collegiate organizations responded by suspending operations indefinitely. This effect was passed down to the world of sports broadcasting, which includes live coverage of thousands of events on an annual basis through stations and network available over the air, through cable, satellite, and IPTV companies, and via streaming and over-the-top services.

References

  1. ↑ "NBC begins "Monday Night Baseball" broadcasts". NBC Sports History Page.
  2. ↑ Shea, Stuart (7 May 2015). Calling the Game: Baseball Broadcasting from 1920 to the Present. SABR, Inc. p. 358. ISBN   9781933599410.
  3. ↑ Dindral, Amandeep (2005-09-14). "ESPN And Major League Baseball Reach Eight-Year Regular-Season Deal Through 2013 - Enhanced Sunday And Monday Franchises; Home Run Derby; Baseball Tonight & More". The Walt Disney Company. Retrieved 2024-01-15.
  4. ↑ "MLB agrees to TV deals with Fox, Turner Sports". ESPN.com. 2012-10-02. Retrieved 2024-01-15.
  5. ↑ "MLB, ESPN agree on record eight-year deal". MLB.com. 2012-08-28. Retrieved 2024-01-15.
  6. ↑ Hughes, Katie. "The Walt Disney Company, ESPN and Major League Baseball Reach Long-Term Rights Extension for Fully Exclusive, Marquee Schedule". ESPN Press Room (Press release). Retrieved 2021-05-23.
  7. ↑ Harrigan, Thomas (May 13, 2021). "MLB, ESPN extend deal through 2028". MLB.com. Retrieved 2024-01-15.
  8. ↑ "ESPN extends deal to air MLB games through '28". ESPN.com. 2021-05-13. Retrieved 2024-01-15.
  9. ↑ Bucholtz, Andrew (2021-05-13). "ESPN announces new MLB deal through 2028, with TV broadcasts dropping from 90 to 30 annually but remaining ones all exclusive". Awful Announcing. Retrieved 2024-01-15.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.