MLS signs a 10 year, $2.5 billion deal with Apple

[af102]

https://www.mlssoccer.com/apple/

You’ll now be able to pay a single entity and watch every single MLS game that happens in a season. No local blackouts, and no national cable only games. Some games may be simulcast on ESPN/Fox Sports/Univision, but they will still be on AppleTV+.

There will be a fee for this on top of the $5/month that AppleTV+ costs, but some games will be free for all ATV+ subscribers. All MLS season ticket holders will get this package included in their tickets (which is something new).

MLS is centralizing all game production and is partnering with Apple to creat tons of content for the league including a Saturday night whip-around show like NFL Redzone.

The one downside is there don’t appear to be any carve outs for local over the air games. Atlanta uses Bally (formerly Fox Sports South), but other teams have deals with local ABC/NBC/CW/FOX affiliates.

If Apple can land NFL Sunday Ticket, they are going to be major sports tv players in the coming years. I can now drop my ATT tv account after the season because it was the only place I could get Bally without jumping through a lot of hoops.

 

[onewoof]

Yet another reason to drop Apple anything... supporting a communist sport ***

edited to add: the money you pay Apple with iPhone, Mac, iPad, iTunes, Apple TV, etc contributes to their extreme left political causes as well btw, and here is one emoji they sponsored to illustrate their causes 🫃

 

[DesotoCountyDawg]

It will be interesting to see how things shake out in the next couple of years as far as regional sports networks go. Those are the lifeblood of MLB and NBA and I know Ballys has been hemorrhaging money.

 

[HotMop]

And just like that, MLS becomes more obscure.

 

[Maroon Eagle]

Next: AFC Richmond to join MLS. **

 

[patdog]

You really have to wonder what the heck Apple is thinking. MLS will never be anything other than a niche sport in the USA. People who like soccer are going to watch the European leagues and the Champions League. People who don't like soccer aren't going to watch anyway. All you're left with is a few fans of each team. MLS does a good job of being an attendance league. But it will never be a good TV/streaming draw.

 

[Maroon Eagle]

They're taking the FOX route and want content.

FOX paid $1.58 billion to the NFL for four years of the NFC in '93.

$2.5 billion to MLS over ten years thirty years later might be - dare I say it - roughly equal?

 

[Bill Shankly]

You really have to wonder what the heck Apple is thinking. MLS will never be anything other than a niche sport in the USA. People who like soccer are going to watch the European leagues and the Champions League. People who don't like soccer aren't going to watch anyway. All you're left with is a few fans of each team. MLS does a good job of being an attendance league. But it will never be a good TV/streaming draw.

Yep, I love to watch the sport, but I could care less about MLS.

 

[11thEagleFan]

Tens of fans are rejoicing.

 

[patdog]

I went to an Atlanta United game last year and it was pretty fun. I might go again some time. I even tried to become a fan and tried to watch them on TV a few times. Never made it more than 10 minutes or so.

 

[dorndawg]

They're taking the FOX route and want content.

FOX paid $1.58 billion to the NFL for four years of the NFC in '93.

$2.5 billion to MLS over ten years thirty years later might be - dare I say it - roughly equal?

This is the answer.

 

[harrybollocks]

Apple gets capitalism. That company makes a ton of money and has incredible market share so it can sometimes promote lefty causes (but not in China). Even Republicans invest in it. Apple products are really good too.

 

[patdog]

Very big difference. The NFL was the most desirable sports product in the USA by a long shot in 1993. MLS isn't, to put it kindly. And MLS prospects to ever be any more than it is now are pretty slim. It will never be able to draw viewers like the major European leagues do now and will 30 years from now.

 

[Bill Shankly]

I went to an Atlanta United game last year and it was pretty fun. I might go again some time. I even tried to become a fan and tried to watch them on TV a few times. Never made it more than 10 minutes or so.

Got our man today by the way! YNWA!

 

[patdog]

Yep. Very good news. Liverpool doesn't have unlimited money like some of the other clubs do, but definitely a lot smarter about which players they do recruit. And, as much as I hate it, for the wages they're demanding (and in today's market probably deserve) you have to let great players like Mane and Salah go sometimes.

 

[Bill Shankly]

Yep. Very good news. Liverpool doesn't have unlimited money like some of the other clubs do, but definitely a lot smarter about which players they do recruit. And, as much as I hate it, for the wages they're demanding (and in today's market probably deserve) you have to let great players like Mane and Salah go sometimes.

Mane will be gone soon for sure. He hasn't looked happy all year. I think they are still hopefull over Salah. I think he wants to leave on a free next year myself. That would mean a huge sign on bonus from somebody.

 

[patdog]

Mane hasn't looked happy for a couple of years now. I think it affected his play last year, but he didn't let it affect his play much this year (possibly because he saw this year as a contract year). I do think the Mane/Salah rivalry rumors last year were completely true. Glad they apparently got things settled before this year started.

 

[Sounder68]

This seems like a great deal for MLS. They get guaranteed money - $250 million per year. Plus, they'll split subscription revenue over the $250 million with Apple each year. I read where some analysts think this model could be the new path all leagues follow.

Additionally, the schedule will be set for almost all matches on Saturday night (with some Wednesdays). That's another bonus since they've played every day of the week until now. It was hard to know when games were scheduled.

As a pretty avid follower of MLS (yes, I know I'm a unicorn...), it's been tough for some local MLS teams to get a regular spot on the RSN or over-the-air networks. In a lot of markets, they are bounced around to multiple channels or some games are carried over-the-air and others are streaming only (ie, even if you WANT to watch, it can be hard to find the channel).

DC United had some nightmares with a streaming service - and it led to a fan revolt because the games were hard to find (but DC United's current ownership isn't great, so that's on them). On the flip side, Seattle and Portland have dedicated over-the-air channels. Plus, I've seen some of the pre-game shows that were no better than cable-access talk shows. Apple/MLS will now produce all of the pre- and post-game shows. So, I'm hopeful they will be higher quality and bring more viewers.

 

[Maroon Eagle]

And at least $160 million more than what they get currently per year. It's a no-brainer deal for MLS.

It's also pretty comparable money-wise to what the NHL gets ($225 million yearly) from Turner.

I knew someone (and patdog did) would ding me for my comparison to the NFL but as far as cost-effectiveness is concerned it still might not be too bad when compared to Fox's current $2 billion annual NFL contract.

 

[Maroon Eagle]

That's certainly true. A more accurate comparison would be to Turner's current NHL deal and comparing the $$$ spent to Fox's current NFL contract.

Apple TV still wouldn't mind content though...

 

[Go Budaw]

They're taking the FOX route and want content.

FOX paid $1.58 billion to the NFL for four years of the NFC in '93.

$2.5 billion to MLS over ten years thirty years later might be - dare I say it - roughly equal?

The $1.58 billion in 1993 dollars is equal to about $3.2 billion today. If that same deal was made now, it would equate to $800 million / year for the NFL content (NFC only). That would value the NFL as a whole as a $1.6 billion valuation per season (excluding MNF).

$2.5 billion for 10 years is equal to $250 million per season for MLS. So the NFL deal is 6.4 times more expensive than the MLS deal. So if you were to say that there are 6.4 times as many NFL viewers as there are MLS viewers, then yes the deals would be roughly equal. But I’d venture a guess that its more of a 20:1 ratio than 6:1 in favor of the NFL, even in 1993 terms. And it may be even more lopsided than that. So I wouldn’t consider those as being equal at all. Either Fox got a hell of a deal in 1993, or Apple way overpaid for MLS. Or maybe a little bit of both.

 

[patdog]

Definitely a no-brainer for MLS. I could be wrong, but to me in 1993 everyone thought Fox overpaid for a product that had a lot of demand. I just don't see that demand ever being there for MLS broadcasts.

 

[Junction John]

Somewhere out there, a certain purple-haired lesbian is pissed right now.**

 

[aTotal360]

Apple has $2.5B between the couch cushions. It’s a no brainer for them. My biggest concern is for MLS. They may not get “mainstream” attention based on the contract.

 

[IBleedMaroonDawg]

You really have to wonder what the heck Apple is thinking. MLS will never be anything other than a niche sport in the USA. People who like soccer are going to watch the European leagues and the Champions League. People who don't like soccer aren't going to watch anyway. All you're left with is a few fans of each team. MLS does a good job of being an attendance league. But it will never be a good TV/streaming draw.

I worked for Apple for a few years and yes they are very left leaning but they have been taking niche market products and ideas and making billions off of them so I wouldn't just hang them for investing major league soccer just yet. Nokia was supposed to dominate the personal telephone market when the iPhone came out and the iPhone was going to suffer a short and arduous death according to the experts at that time. They were also going to die when they gave their operating systems away on their computers and phones for free right after they died before that because nobody would by their expensive computers anymore.

 

[coachnorm]

Yet another reason to drop Apple anything... supporting a communist sport ***

edited to add: the money you pay Apple with iPhone, Mac, iPad, iTunes, Apple TV, etc contributes to their extreme left political causes as well btw, and here is one emoji they sponsored to illustrate their causes 遲

The world only has a few Communist countries left and they are not good at soccer? MLS games have about the same average attendance as MLB games do, in America, in 2022. The average age of the Baseball viewer is about 57 or 58. The average age of MLS viewership is in their 20s. The writing is on the wall that soccer will surpass baseball when the old grey beards die off of old age. That is why the big money is heading that way, its called monetary survival. Big money could care less about future viewers that will have died off of old age: bad business practice?

 

[coachnorm]

It will be interesting to see how things shake out in the next couple of years as far as regional sports networks go. Those are the lifeblood of MLB and NBA and I know Ballys has been hemorrhaging money.

The reason why Ballys is hemorrhaging money is baseball has lost the youth of America because of a business model favoring the old traditionalist who are dying off of old age or so senile they cant stay up and watch television? Baseball is not the youth pass time like it used to be; they watch soccer.

 

[patdog]

Apples to oranges (no pun intended). Apple had complete control over their product, and Nokia wasn't the established dominant player in the industry (which was brand new at the time). Produce a better product and of course people will buy it. Not the case with MLS. It will never produce a better product than the top European leagues. US soccer fans will not watch MLS in large numbers no matter what Apple does.

 

[Sounder68]

My final 2-cents on this MLS/Apple deal…

If they let Alexi Lalas anywhere near these broadcasts, I’m throwing my Apple products in the river and buying Androids.

 

[Smoked Toag]

You really have to wonder what the heck Apple is thinking. MLS will never be anything other than a niche sport in the USA. People who like soccer are going to watch the European leagues and the Champions League. People who don't like soccer aren't going to watch anyway. All you're left with is a few fans of each team. MLS does a good job of being an attendance league. But it will never be a good TV/streaming draw.

100% agree. If you're a pro sport and aren't the best, you won't get the TV eyes. I also agree about in-person attendance. I used to attend in-person a local pro hockey league years ago, but I would never watch it on TV. It was just something to do, not appointment viewing.

 

[Smoked Toag]

The reason why Ballys is hemorrhaging money is baseball has lost the youth of America because of a business model favoring the old traditionalist who are dying off of old age or so senile they cant stay up and watch television? Baseball is not the youth pass time like it used to be; they watch soccer.

Can you explain this more? What business model? Travel ball? That's far from old traditionalist.

I think baseball has lost the youth because it's boring. At least that's what my kid tells me. And soccer isn't any better in that regard.

 

[coachnorm]

Can you explain this more? What business model? Travel ball? That's far from old traditionalist.

I think baseball has lost the youth because it's boring. At least that's what my kid tells me. And soccer isn't any better in that regard.

I am someone who has had passion for many years. I can tell you the batting stances of Carl Yastremski, Fred Lynn, Dwight Evans, Ricky Henderson, George Foster, ETC. That is how ingrained baseball has been into me. I know who many of the baseball announcers are clearly. The youth, of America, have not received baseball at this level. They might watch baseball on a trial basis and know nothing because of old traditionalist pandering to their older clientele and not their replacements. Something as simple as a pitch clock is resisted by the traditionalist? The traditionalist get their way and die off and with that baseball starts a slow cancerous death also. Because baseball favors travel ball for the exclusive, only the exclusive will not be filtered out of the future viewing public thus a majority have been physically alienated from the game.

Apple knows the new alienation of baseball to the youth of America. Apple observes the soccer people in the stands and sees young people and many young girls and women there. There is more diversity in the soccer games even though mostly white observers. CBS is trying drastically to catch up with NBC in soccer coverage knowing that future revenues will occur in the new future. Maybe Apple's move is visionary and a good business decision for future revenues?

 

[Smoked Toag]

I am someone who has had passion for many years. I can tell you the batting stances of Carl Yastremski, Fred Lynn, Dwight Evans, Ricky Henderson, George Foster, ETC. That is how ingrained baseball has been into me. I know who many of the baseball announcers are clearly. The youth, of America, have not received baseball at this level. They might watch baseball on a trial basis and know nothing because of old traditionalist pandering to their older clientele and not their replacements. Something as simple as a pitch clock is resisted by the traditionalist? The traditionalist get their way and die off and with that baseball starts a slow cancerous death also. Because baseball favors travel ball for the exclusive, only the exclusive will not be filtered out of the future viewing public thus a majority have been physically alienated from the game.

Apple knows the new alienation of baseball to the youth of America. Apple observes the soccer people in the stands and sees young people and many young girls and women there. There is more diversity in the soccer games even though mostly white observers. CBS is trying drastically to catch up with NBC in soccer coverage knowing that future revenues will occur in the new future. Maybe Apple's move is visionary and a good business decision for future revenues?

Agree on what Apple is trying to do (this is obvious), though I don't think soccer is the correct route. But I digress, as I'm more interested in the baseball side of this discussion.....

I guess what I'm not agreeing with is this traditionalist deal. Not really sure about all that, I think it's a lot deeper. Rewind the clock to 1993, baseball was king in the spring and summer. All kids played at some level, and baseball cards were everywhere. What happened? Well - the strike killed a lot of it, then the steroid era hurt even more, as it took away a lot of the statistical aspect of it. Sabremetrics also arose in that era, and while they took the place of some of the lost stats space, they made the game incredibly boring, as it's now all velo and bombs. I just don't think people like to watch that, it has made an already slow game even slower. Then you have things like shifts, etc.

On the youth side, I think the rise of travel ball, which was just a by-product of the popularity of youth sports, is not really the cause. Because even the last holdouts are still playing rec then ultimately joining travel, and spending gobs of money. MLB has all these urban youth academies now too, not sure how that's working out. And the 'traditionalists' hate every aspect of these things.

All that to say, it's a combination of things. What can baseball really do? Maybe some fundamental changes to the game. Pitch clock, no shifts, shorten the season so the postseason isn't in freaking October. I don't know. Seems like we may need more teams to develop some tribalism.

 

[Bill Shankly]

I am someone who has had passion for many years. I can tell you the batting stances of Carl Yastremski, Fred Lynn, Dwight Evans, Ricky Henderson, George Foster, ETC. That is how ingrained baseball has been into me. I know who many of the baseball announcers are clearly. The youth, of America, have not received baseball at this level. They might watch baseball on a trial basis and know nothing because of old traditionalist pandering to their older clientele and not their replacements. Something as simple as a pitch clock is resisted by the traditionalist? The traditionalist get their way and die off and with that baseball starts a slow cancerous death also. Because baseball favors travel ball for the exclusive, only the exclusive will not be filtered out of the future viewing public thus a majority have been physically alienated from the game.

Apple knows the new alienation of baseball to the youth of America. Apple observes the soccer people in the stands and sees young people and many young girls and women there. There is more diversity in the soccer games even though mostly white observers. CBS is trying drastically to catch up with NBC in soccer coverage knowing that future revenues will occur in the new future. Maybe Apple's move is visionary and a good business decision for future revenues?

You are aware that soccer has travel ball too right? If anything it's more exclusive than baseball.

 

[Bill Shankly]

Mane hasn't looked happy for a couple of years now. I think it affected his play last year, but he didn't let it affect his play much this year (possibly because he saw this year as a contract year). I do think the Mane/Salah rivalry rumors last year were completely true. Glad they apparently got things settled before this year started.

The Mane deal is done. 35 million pounds up front with another 7 million in achievable add ins for achievement. Bayern Munich as expected. Good business from Liverpool. That's more than they paid for him 6 years ago. He is 30 and were going to lose him on a free next year anyway. Same situation for Salah. He would be worth a little more but he wants that free I think. Keeping him for a year might be with the 45 million. Losing both him and Mane in the same year would be a really abrupt transition.

 

[patdog]

I was hoping for more like 40M up front plus another 5M in add ons. But it was kind of a forced sale. He probably wouldn't have accepted a sale anywhere else and if you don't sell him, you've got a disgruntled player who you'll get nothing for next year anyway. I think you're right about Salah. He wants the free transfer next year, although I think he'd be willing to stay long-term if Liverpool met his price (which they probably won't). Also agree, better to lose them over 2 years than both at once. This way allows a year to bring Nunez along and then he can be ready to be a major contributor next year. I think the one thing left for Liverpool to do is add a good midfield player. Depth is a little lacking and the corps we have now is getting up there in age.

 

[Bill Shankly]

I was hoping for more like 40M up front plus another 5M in add ons. But it was kind of a forced sale. He probably wouldn't have accepted a sale anywhere else and if you don't sell him, you've got a disgruntled player who you'll get nothing for next year anyway. I think you're right about Salah. He wants the free transfer next year, although I think he'd be willing to stay long-term if Liverpool met his price (which they probably won't). Also agree, better to lose them over 2 years than both at once. This way allows a year to bring Nunez along and then he can be ready to be a major contributor next year. I think the one thing left for Liverpool to do is add a good midfield player. Depth is a little lacking and the corps we have now is getting up there in age.

According to all the sources that usually know what they are talking about Liverpool's incoming transfer deals are DONE for this window. I agree on the midfield.

 

[Bill Shankly]

It looks like the up front was 27m with the potential total being 35m. That's according to Paul Joyce, who is almost always spot on when it comes to Liverpool.

 

[patdog]

I hope Curtis Jones and Harvey Elliot are better and more ready than I think they are. Players who grew up in the academy sometimes tend to be over-hyped and don't live up to the expectations.

 

[Bill Shankly]

I hope Curtis Jones and Harvey Elliot are better and more ready than I think they are. Players who grew up in the academy sometimes tend to be over-hyped and don't live up to the expectations.

Harvey is not a Liverpool Acadamy product.