Thought I would post this since I don’t think I’ve seen it here yet. It’s been known for a while that Apple was going to be the broadcast partner for MLS but full details came out recently. It seems like most fans are pretty excited about this. I thought it would be a good move as long as you could still watch local market teams on local stations. Seems that’s no longer the case. “Every match, every screen, no blackouts” seems to be their tagline, referencing the ESPN blackouts for local games that were already being shown in the market. I would add no blackouts as long as you pay us $100.
Unfortunately, I’m arguably just a casual fan but I will likely become less of a fan because of this move. I would break out the antenna last year to watch almost every CLT game and attended a few games as well. Now, I won’t be able to watch any games and likely won’t go to any either since I won’t have as much of a connection to the team. The argument I’ve seen against that is that Apple is planning to show 6 MLS games a week for free. But I’m not got to just watch a random MLS game because I can, I want to watch CLT FC. Oh well.
Yeah I think going Apple and not allowing local broadcasts is a bad move for a league trying to build a larger fanbase. I am not getting apple TV and I watched nearly every game on TV last year.
Agreed. I already pay for too many streaming services. I’m not adding Apple to watch MLS.
What we should do as consumers is juggle our active subscriptions, but how many of us make the effort to do that?
Not having the games on local TV was a terrible idea for the Hornets and is even worse for the startup MLS club.
Yeah, we try to juggle services as much as possible or use family logins. We never pay for Hulu and netflix at the same time. Catch up on all the shows we watch on one service, drop that one, start paying for the next, and catch up on the shows over there.
I wouldn’t pay to watch the NFL so I’m definitely not paying to watch MLS.
It might make sense one day if a streaming service starts selling all of the local channels plus the basic sports channels w/ unlimited DVR, etc for a stripped down price, and then people add whatever additional streaming services they want to add.
But until then, most people are paying around $100-$150 for live TV plus various streaming services (if not more), so every additional subscription is not “just $X dollars”… It’s on top of that.
So, are you guys saying APPLE will be the ONLY place to watch CLT FC this year, on “tv”? No more “regular tv” option?
There are limited games on other networks like fox. But CLTFC will only have one game shown there.
There will also be limited games shown for free on Apple but no guarantee those will include CLTFC.
Yeah, but basically all of the games were on WAXN last year iirc…oh well, peace out CLT FC.
Correct. I broke out my antenna for each game last year. Can’t do it this year and I won’t be paying $100 for the MLS season pass. So I just won’t be watching CLTFC anymore unfortunately
Same thing I said to the Hornets when they went to Bally sports.
Absolutely stupid decision for a fledgling franchise. Gonna lose so many casual viewers. This isn’t the Yankees.
Unfortunately there was nothing CLTFC could do about this. It was an all or nothing deal for MLS and Apple. Agreed though, horrible decision
Trying to determine the governing structure of MLS. Figured its board would be composed of the owner or top executive from each franchise a la NFL but nothing popping up on the official MLS website other than league office execs. If its BOD is the owners etc, then CLTFC and the other teams should have input on TV contracts.
The kicker with that ridiculous TV deal, all of these east coast games MUST kick off at 7:30pm…that’s going to be really awesome in the summer time here with those late afternoon storms.
Not a fan of this either, I enjoyed last season much more than I thought I would because of the access on local TV. I’m not into it enough to pay for Apple though.
exactly.
Is the club still streaming the games on their website? Or is that over too?
I saw some people on Reddit say that there would be no streaming options available on club websites either.
