Seattle Mariners President Talks About Future of ROOT Sports
The Seattle Mariners will have to watch the playoffs from home for the 22nd time in 23 years after being eliminated in the final week of the season for the third time in four years.
The Mariners' season hadn't been over for a week before comments from the front office drew some ire from fans.
In an article published by Adam Jude and Ryan Divish on Sept. 30 (the day after the season ended), Seattle president and chairman John Stanton implied that the team wouldn't go after big-name free agents. This came days after comments from the organization's President of Baseball Operations Jerry Dipoto said that payroll would increase for the 2025 season.
This is already a departure from the where the team was last year after there was a lot of controversy surrounding payroll. One of the main reasons for the team's turmoil regarding their available funds was due to the franchise's ROOT Sports channel, which the organization acquired sole possession of in January after owning a 70% stake prior.
Over the course of the season, there's been a lot more disappointing updates with ROOT. After the ciiy's NHL franchise, the Seattle Kraken, announced that they wouldn't continue broadcasting on ROOT, the Pacific Northwest's NBA franchise the Portland Trailblazers also announced that they wouldn't be broadcasting on the channel anymore.
Dipoto assured that the payroll situation won't be nearly as volatile as it appeared to be last season, but there's still questions beyond next season on what exactly the organization's franchise situation will be.
According to an article published by MLB.com's Daniel Kramer on Friday, the Mariners haven't decided on where they'll broadcast their games past 2025 according to Stanton. There's the bankruptcy court ruling on Diamond Sports Group, which owns Bally Sports Networks. DSG produces and broadcasts more than a third of MLB teams' games. There's still some dominoes left to fall before the organization decided whether to keep their home on ROOT Sports or moves it elsewhere.
Stanton commented on the pending bankruptcy ruling in Kramer's article:
“That will allow us to know what other teams are doing. And that will give us some sense as to what it is that MLB would have to sell, basically. If there are a lot of teams involved, then they've got an ability to deliver to distributors, such as the cable companies, a broader set of markets, and therefore something more valuable to those distributors.”
It seems like there's a chance that Seattle could soon find a new TV home along with several other franchises.
But as long as fans can see winning baseball, they will likely follow the Mariners to whatever home they choose.
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