WASHINGTON (AP) — The Washington Nationals finally are setting up their own deal for local television telecasts, announcing Wednesday that games will be produced and distributed by Major League Baseball after years of legal wrangling over a channel in which the Baltimore Orioles held a controlling interest.
Nationals.TV will make the club's games available locally via cable and satellite and the MLB streaming platform.
This move comes nearly a year
after Major League Baseball said Washington would be freed from its longtime deal with the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network (MASN) following the 2025 season, ending a legal fight that dated to 2012 between the Nationals and Orioles over television rights.
MASN was established in 2005, the year the Montreal Expos moved to Washington and became the Nationals, moving into what had been Baltimore’s exclusive broadcast territory since 1972. The Orioles were given a supermajority partnership interest in MASN, starting at 90%, and Washington made a $75 million payment to the network for an initial 10%.
The Nationals are the seventh club partnering with MLB for local game telecasts, along with the Arizona Diamondbacks, Cleveland Guardians, Colorado Rockies and Minnesota Twins, San Diego Padres and Seattle Mariners.
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