One Day Before Postseason Began, Rob Manfred Changed Terms Of MLBTV Contract, Making It Impossible For Fans To Watch Any Postseason Games Without Paying For Additional Cable/Streaming Services And Now Refuses To Answer Questions From Irate Fans & Reporters

Last Thursday, only one day before the 2022 postseason was to begin, Commissioner Rob Manfred changed the terms of MLB's contract with its hundreds of thousands of MLBTV subscribers, a "deceptive" move, making it impossible for those fans to see any postseason games, according to The Athletic.

On Thursday, some fans abroad, including many in the United Kingdom, discovered that if they wanted to watch MLB's postseason, their subscription to MLB.tv's package would no longer cut it. In a departure from the past in some countries, MLB was asking fans to pony up additional cash to one of MLB's broadcast partners if they wanted to watch the games — and the fans said they didn't know as much until the playoffs were about to start. . . .

The Athletic reached out to a spokesperson at the commissioner's office by phone on Thursday evening, and was told to email questions. The Athletic sent several. More than 24 hours later, the commissioner's office had not provided a quote to explain the situation.

Manfred arranges this deceptive change in secret (though the deals were made long ago) just before the first pitch of the playoffs. Then he refuses to talk to anyone in the media about it. Then he orders a reporter to email his questions -- and completely ignores the emailed questions. Can Manfred say FUCK YOU! to the fans any clearer?

In past seasons, MLBTV subscriptions always included the postseason -- because paying for MLBTV was paying for the season and the season included the postfuckingseason. Even if the MLBTV agreement states postseason games will be included, I'm sure it also states MLB can change the terms of the agreement at any time for any reason so haha fucked you again, suckers.

MLB states that in 2022 "during the MLB Postseason, subscribers in the US must authenticate to a participating Pay TV provider" to access any postseason games. Why would that be? It's "[d]ue to Major League Baseball exclusivities".

In addition, "[l]ive games are not available outside the U.S. on MLB.TV with exception of various countries. The list does not include Canada, the United Kingdom, Mexico, or Australia. But it does include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China, Egypt, Iceland, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Libya, Myanmar, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, South Korea, Thailand, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan, Vatican City, and Vietnam.

As Maury Brown reported for Forbes, on Thursday "international customers were informed that due to blackout policies with broadcast partners they would be blacked out on [MLBTV] and would need to watch on television, leaving cord-cutters or never-corders being forced to potentially pay extra for those network streaming packages".

Fucking stupid Rob Manfred just proved himself a big fucking idiot and jerk by changing the MLBTV terms and conditions 2 DAYS BEFORE postseason starts, and fucks international fans right in the faces. Postseason games are now BLACKED OUT overseas. WTF?!

— Colleen (@Kool404Canton) October 7, 2022

fuck mlbtv and fuck rob manfred. frauds and con artists. where is the respect for fans? i can’t watch the most mlb important games of the season on the PAID MLB STREAMING SERVICE??????????? sell outs with absolutely no actual intention to grow the game, only their bank balances.

— initsogA ammE (@emmaaaaaaaaaago) October 8, 2022

The fans want what they paid for, postseason games streamed, they don't want some cash back. Fuck Rob Manfred, fuck the owners, fuck the blackout rules, fuck 'em all. https://t.co/48BFchbssb

— David Young 🎙️ #Vin (@DavidYoungTBLA) October 8, 2022

Of course. Because the best solution would be to make the games available, so naturally, MLB won’t do that. Way to grow the game, guys!

— Pardon Reality Winner (@Michael_Cook64) October 8, 2022

Well done to MLBtv for blacking out all the postseason games for international fans. If you want to grow the sport, the obvious strategy is to stop people being able to watch the business end of the season.... Rob Manfred remains a master strategist.

— Tim (@timmsy_ks) October 6, 2022

"Believe me," [Manfred] says, "we hate blackouts as much as fans do." LOL. Fuck off. #MLB https://t.co/fu0QwVjUbx

— Tempus Finivit (@janerationx) October 7, 2022

No sport or entrainment company works harder to actively prevent fans from seeing their product then @MLB

— Ewok_Baseball (@Baseball_Ewok) October 8, 2022

Rob Manfred never stops innovating ways to punish the limited number of people who want to follow this sport.

— Clay C. (@ClayC1969) October 8, 2022

Somebody go ask Rob Manfred if he hates baseball again pic.twitter.com/XMAEZNOEs8

— Tyson Shushkewich (@Tyson_MLB) October 6, 2022

MLBtv has at least one and sometimes several blacked out games every week for national broadcasts, apple TV, peacock, or some other nonsense. Pretty irritating when you've only got time for a game once in a while and can't watch it on the expensive package you purchased. 🤡

— Oblee (@obleemusic) October 8, 2022

According to some information on Twitter, MLB may have allowed some -- but not all! -- of Sunday's Padres/Mets game to be viewed by MLBTV customers. I know of no other response from MLB to this clusterfuck train wreck shitshow of a dumpster fire. Hey, just another boring day at the office and business as usual for Rob Manfred, though.

Manfred already siphoned off random games throughout the just-completed season to Apple TV+, Facebook, and other services, making side deals that put fans wanting to see their teams in the dark if they did not shell out additional money for those particular services. It turns out that paying for MLBTV, which promises viewers the ability to watch every game during the season, mean viewer do not have the ability to watch every game during the season.

At a time when more and more people are dumping overpriced, bloated cable packages or simply never wasting their time subscribing to cable in the first place, Manfred (and the owners that unanimously support his anti-baseball decisions) have decided to double-down on making cable networks essential for most fans to watch the season's most important games (when it's decided who wins the coveted Piece of Metal™).

Manfred can then act puzzled as to why young people are not drawn to the game. Did you know the average age of the typical baseball fan (in 2017) was 57 years old? Fifty-fucking-seven!! That was up from 52 only a decade earlier. It's probably 60 by now. You would think that facing that type of grim reality, MLB as an institution would be exposing young people to the game as easily and cheaply as possible. Manfred has decided to do the exact opposite. You can always count on MLB, when making any decision, to go with absolute worst option, the option that screws over the most loyal fans of the sport in the worst way possible. Every. Single. Time.

Manfred has also added rough a half-dozen gimmicky new rules (with several more guaranteed for 2023), desecrating baseball's historical continuity in the process. One reason for these moronic rules is because Manfred is either (a) scared to tell the umpires to uphold the unenforced pace of play rule that has been part of the rule book for more than a century or (b) too goddamn stupid to know that Rule 5.07(c) exists.

Bud Selig may have been a horrible commissioner, but it was clear he liked baseball. It's equally obvious Rob Manfred hates baseball (or, at best, is indifferent to the point of never thinking about it at all) so he's happy to destroy it -- and shit on the game's most loyal fans at the same time -- all to squeeze out a few more dollars that the mega-wealthy owners will never notice.

In conclusion, fuck you Rob Manfred (and fuck you team owners for supporting this complete asshole to ru(i)n your sport). The day you have nothing to do with major league baseball cannot come fast enough.