When MLB.tv first came out it was revolutionary. For years there after it was still by far the best streaming option. When WWE Network launched, they hired the guys from MLB.tv to design and implement it.
One of the things I was always most impressed by was the ability to do radio commentary with the TV display. Sync between the two was amazing, which is super hard to implement from my experience. Radio audio has always been my preference. I love baseball on the radio, and when I was a kid in the 80s-90s whenever the game was on broadcast TV (we didn’t have cable) my dad would turn down the volume and put on the radio. Doesn’t work now-a-days with digital TV.
Originally you could choose either teams broadcast, and any of the audios (i.e. the BlueJays broadcast on Sportsnet with Tigers radio from 97.1 the Ticket, for example). A few years ago, they switched it so you could only pick radio from the same TV (if you watched the Bluejays stream you could only have Bluejays TV or radio audio). That wasn’t that big a deal. The camera view is [practically?] the same. Only noticeable difference is how the digital scoreboard looks
This year it is practically unwatchable. Even if I keep audio on the TV audio the audio doesn’t line up with what is showing on the screen.
I’m not sure if it is as bad when you watch live, I normally put on last night’s game in the background the next morning while I’m at work, but I would be surprised if audio/video sync is better live, if anything I’d expect worse.
This doesn’t happen if I watch it on ESPN linked to my MLB.tv. I do prefer watching it on ESPN because of the commercials. Personally, I’d rather have actual commercials than the silence along with “commercial break” showing on the screen. The audio/video does sync on ESPN, but I’ve lost the ability for radio audio.
The conspiracy theorist in me thinks the recent degradation is specifically about trying to draw folks to the ESPN streaming experience, but my logical mind says there is no way of that.
I’m not the only one, right? Do you have any different experience? Any idea why the quality has gone to crap. Enshitification?
My favorite part of when I subscribed is that I couldn’t watch my local games through the official goddamn app due to blackout restrictions.
It’s like the MLB doesn’t actually want people to watch baseball.
I still can’t get over the fact they don’t have a mode that simply skips all the ad breaks when watching an archived stream
