Major League Baseball
Sportsnet holds the national contract with MLB to carry national broadcasts, including the MLB All-Star Game and the postseason, with the current contract expiring in 2013. Since May 2010, it has sub-licensed its rights to Sunday Night Baseball to TSN2 for the same period, in exchange for TSN and TSN2 releasing their rights to Toronto Blue Jays games. However, individual SNB games may still air on Sportsnet in the event of scheduling conflicts on both TSN and TSN2.
All Canadian broadcast rights to Blue Jays games are now held by Sportsnet, with the possible exception of any SNB games (however, the Jays have not been featured on SNB in several years). Since August 2010, some games have aired on the digital-only channel Sportsnet One (as opposed to the regional Sportsnet channels which are available on analogue cable). Since the Blue Jays and Sportsnet are both wholly owned by Rogers Communications, Sportsnet's rights are of indefinite duration.
Most Sportsnet channels (including Sportsnet One) also carry a variety of non-Blue Jays games of regional interest that are not part of the U.S. national packages. For example, Sportsnet Pacific carries many Seattle Mariners games, while Sportsnet East carries several Boston Red Sox games, simulcasting the applicable local broadcaster. Sportsnet also airs many games involving the New York Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers.
The MLB Extra Innings pay-per-view package is available through Canadian PPV services.
Finally, U.S. over-the-air coverage, such as the national Saturday afternoon package on Fox and sometimes team broadcasts from local stations, is also available in Canada. Peachtree TV, an Atlanta station which holds a share of the local broadcast rights to the Atlanta Braves, is available through most Canadian cable and satellite providers, and on rare occasions has covered games between the Braves and the Blue Jays not covered by any Canadian outlet. The same applies to WGN-TV and WPIX, which are also carried in Canada as superstations.
Read more about this topic: Sports Broadcasting Contracts In Canada, Baseball
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