Center Field Shot 

                                                           The Baseball Network

Major League Baseball was set for dramatic change.  In September 1992, the owners fired Commissioner Vincent.  He had alienated them by undermining their spring training lockout in 1990 and pushing his plan for franchise realignment.  Vincent was replaced Bud Selig, president of the Milwaukee Brewers.  For the first time, the commissioner of baseball would be an owner, bursting any illusion that the commissioner was an independent arbitrator with only the “best interest of the game” at heart.   Future owner/player conflicts would be reduced to a simple management versus labor contest with no umpire, not even an illusionary one. 

The disastrous CBS contract also ended the delusion that the major networks could continue to pay more each contract for smaller audiences and fewer regular season games.   When MLB’s Television Committee encountered network offers half as high as the previous contract and a similar cable revenue cutback from ESPN, it began looking for a new formula that would reduce the risk for networks and minimize the lost revenue.  Their prescription was for the owners to enter the television business. 

The Baseball Network (TBN), a joint business venture of MLB, ABC, and NBC, dramatically altered the relationship between Major League Baseball and the television industry.  Unlike all previous major national sports contracts, TBN dispensed with all upfront money.  MLB was responsible for the sale of advertising time, actually competing with the networks for national advertising dollars.  For their efforts, MLB would keep approximately 87.5% of the revenues, while ABC and NBC divided the rest.  The networks got revenue and a promotional platform from baseball with no risk.  Eddie Einhorn, minority owner of the White Sox and member of MLB’s Television Committee, believed the new approach was “about control of the future.  You can’t really do a traditional rights deal anymore.   You have to devise something different.  That’s what we did.”