ESPN and Baseball Feuding Over Deal

A dispute between ESPN and major league baseball over the placement of three Sunday night games in September has reached such magnitude that it could mean the end of all regular-season baseball on ESPN after this season.

Baseball confirmed Tuesday that it has terminated the regular-season contract with ESPN, effective at the end of the season, thus ending a 10-year relationship.

ESPN announced that it filed suit Tuesday in U.S. District Court in New York seeking an injunction to block baseball from terminating the contract. ESPN contends that it has a contract with baseball through 2002.

The dispute stems from ESPN’s contract with the NFL to carry a full season of Sunday night football, which took effect in 1998. To make room for football, ESPN had to move three baseball games to ESPN2.

ESPN reaches 76.2 million homes, ESPN2 64.2 million.

Dick Glover, ESPN executive vice president of programming, said Tuesday the contract with baseball permits as many as 10 ESPN preemptions a year for “events of significant interest.” He said ESPN has preempted baseball games in the past without a problem.

Glover said baseball’s action “makes no sense.” He said ESPN has made substantial proposals to resolve the matter and each one has been rejected.

Paul Beeston, president and CEO of major league baseball, said, “We have had a good relationship with ESPN throughout this decade and we still cling to hope that it will continue into the next.

“However, we have been negotiating with ESPN for more than a year to reach a reasonable and amicable resolution of its willful violation of our contract. No ESPN offer has ever addressed their deliberate breach. Each of the several offers we made to address their breach was rejected out of hand. We must now move forward and explore other options.”