Just three years after its introduction, Friday Night Baseball on Apple TV+ could be coming to an end. Yahoo Sports’ Kendall Baker reported last week that Apple’s contract with Friday Night Baseball is “up in the air” (after initially reporting that “Apple is fully out”) and that NBC/Peacock may take over. While there will surely be some Apple TV+ fans who lament Apple’s decision to end its foray into the complicated world of sports streaming, I won’t be sorry to see it go.
Introduced in 2022, Friday Night Baseball was Apple’s first foray into sports coverage on its Apple TV+ video streaming service, with a reported $600 million with Major League Baseball. That agreement was followed in 2023 by a $2.5 billion megadeal with Major League Soccer to exclusively broadcast matches for 10 years. The two deals indicated an effort by Apple to find a niche it can carve for itself and insert itself into the conversation with Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, HBO Max, and others as a major service provider.
While Friday Night Baseball has offered some of the best broadcast quality, its random assortment of games and rotating studio crew has generated weekly complaints on social media. Plus, it doesn’t appear to have had a meaningful effect on Apple TV+ subscriptions. It’s not clear whether Apple or MLB is the impetus behind the discussions to break the 7-year contract early, but neither would be surprising.
Other factors hint that Apple’s vaunted MLS deal may not be around for much longer, either. While MLS commissioner Dan Garber has publicly praised Apple as “a great technology partner” and appreciates the consistent broadcast schedule, which was once a huge problem for MLS, he has also cited issues with viewer analytics (reportedly 120,000 unique viewers per match) as well as the challenge to “ensure enough people have access to our games.”
For the 2025 season, efforts were made to make MLS Season Pass more accessible, including availability through Xfinity and DirecTV, as well as weekly free Sunday games. And a recent poll of 4,000 people who do pay found that 72 percent feel the $99 fee for Apple TV+’s MLS Season Pass ($79 for subscribers) is too expensive.
Granted, $99 for more than a thousand games isn’t a bad value, but it speaks to a larger issue: sports on streaming services make it harder and more expensive for fans to watch. Like many MLB and NBA fans, the only reason I keep my cable TV subscription is to watch local games whenever I want. I understand why Apple wanted to break into the lucrative sports market to begin with, but it also makes sense why they would want to bow out—no matter how great the production is, sports on streaming services is inherently user-unfriendly.
For example, I have free access to MLS Season Pass on Apple TV+ because it’s part of my mobile data plan. I don’t use it, however, because it’s easier to watch games on Fox and FS1. Granted, MLS Season Pass offers many more matches than I can get on cable TV, but it’s good enough for casual fans. The same goes for MLB Friday Night baseball. Outside of a handful of must-see games each season, it’s easier to just watch whatever’s on my local cable network.
The past tells us that Apple’s recent bidding history is filled with sports deals that never happened. The possible end of Friday Night Baseball comes just days after The Athletic reported that Apple not only had interest in Sunday Night Baseball, which currently airs on ESPN, but also the first round of the MLB playoffs. Last year, Apple was reportedly in talks with FIFA for the rights to the 2025 Club World Cup. It was reported in 2022 that Apple was in the running for the rights to NFL Sunday Ticket, but was outbid by YouTube. And as recently as this past July, reports indicated that Apple made an aggressive $150-million-per-year bid for the rights for Formula 1 racing in the U.S. following the success of the F1 movie.
And that’s not to mention games on other streaming services. As noted in this Reddit post, you’ll need access to no less than five streaming services plus ESPN and local networks to watch every NFL game this season: NFL+, Netflix, Amazon Prime, Peacock, and YouTube. Even if you were to get all of them for free, it’s still a massive pain to remember what’s on where.
Then there’s the general watching experience, which varies from service to service and doesn’t encourage multi-game viewing. Like most sports fans, I like to flip to other games during breaks, and when streaming, you can’t flip around instantly. You have to exit the game you’re watching, navigate out to the selection menu, pick another game, and then wait for it to load. That’s not the one-button, instant gratification you get with a TV broadcast.
It’s widely known that Apple VP of Services Eddy Cue is a huge sports fan–an interview with GQ Sports describes Cue as Apple’s “sports ambassador”–and he clearly wants Apple to be a player. But how big of a game Apple will play remains to be seen. Should that F1 deal not materialize and Friday Night Baseball and MLS Season Pass come to an end, that would be clear indicators that Apple is closing the book on its sports coverage.
I understand that sports streaming is here to stay and only getting stronger. Peacock, Prime Video, and Netflix are all grabbing pieces of the pie, leaving sports fans grappling with the inevitable eventuality that it will get too difficult and expensive to watch every game they want. And it’ll be just as well if Apple retreats to the sidelines.
Foundry
Welcome to our weekly Apple Breakfast column, which includes all the Apple news you missed last week in a handy bite-sized roundup. We call it Apple Breakfast because we think it goes great with a Monday morning cup of coffee or tea, but it’s cool if you want to give it a read during lunch or dinner hours too.
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Podcast of the week
It’s the second episode of our brand new version of the Macworld Podcast. On this show, we talk about Apple’s big boo-boo last week that unintentionally revealed upcoming plans for the MacBook Pro, Mac Pro, Apple Watch, iPad, and more. Plus, what we’re watching (or not watching) on Apple TV+, what happened this week in Apple history, and the Macworld Podcast mailbag.
You can catch every episode of the Macworld Podcast on YouTube, Spotify, Soundcloud, the Podcasts app, or our own site.
Reviews corner
This Plugable dock will bring 5-display bliss to your MacBook workstation.
The Kratfgeek Just Tap Tripod is a clever twist on the classic selfie stick.
The rumor mill
Apple code reveals Touch ID could be coming to the Apple Watch
Another report claims the iPhone 18 will skip its usual September release slot.
Apple’s next ‘e’ phone could dump the notch for the Dynamic Island.
Apple is reportedly making a new luxury iPhone case to replace FineWoven.
Video of the week
Enjoy all our short-form video on TikTok or Instagram.
Software updates, bugs, and problems
A new iOS 26 beta is here as the release nears ever closer.
Apple has updated iOS 18 and macOS 15 with critical bug and security fixes
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