I just got off the phone with DirecTV, and according to them, their contract doesn’t allow them to start MLB Extra Innings until April 4th. Who would negotiate such a contract? I pay $210 a year for the package on DTV. I could pay a lot less to MLB.com, get it on my Roku, and see these games! Did MLB really not want these games broadcast on DirecTV, or did DTV just not want to deal with two odd games? I’m trying to find out, but this is a huge fail by the satellite provider.
If you look at the DirecTV EI schedule here, the game is listed as on Extra Innings, with the channel to be announced. Clearly, at some point DTV thought they were going to broadcast the game.
Perhaps they didn’t think MLB would do something as silly as claim the season was starting in March, but someone in scheduling stuck the Japan games on there without checking.
That’s fraud.
If the baseball season opens, and no one is there to see it, does it still count in the standings?