How Major League Baseball Could Crack $11 Billion In Revenues In 2022

It took 99 days for Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association to reach a new labor deal, pushing out the start of the season by a week, but today marks Opening Day for the league. A host of new business has the capacity to push the league’s revenues back into record territory.

For MLB, 2022 should be more like 2019. Strike that: it should be better. While the specter of Covid-19 still hanging over the U.S., for the most part, large gatherings for entertainment are back in full force. Baseball will be a big benefactor due to that, and more.

If the nearly 100 days of the league-imposed lockout did any damage to the business of baseball, you’d be hard-pressed to find it. The league continued to find new revenues through broadcast, streaming, and sponsorship agreements that coupled with the ability to push ballparks back to their full capacity should push gross revenues to the rarified air of $11 billion in gross revenues.

The last time Major League Baseball revealed gross revenues was 2019 when it hit $10.7 billion. Here’s what’s happened since then to push that number higher.

New National Broadcast Deals With FOX, TBS, And ESPN

The league’s three national television broadcast partners renewed with MLB for 2022-28 that will see a total of $12.24 billion over the life of the agreements with FOX, TBS, and ESPN, an increase of 17% annually from $1.5 billion to $1.76 billion.

Streaming Deals With Apple And NBC’s Peacock

While the league did renew with ESPN, the terms of the renewal shifted as the Worldwide Leader dropped their mid-week regular-season games and focused on Sunday Night Baseball. That opened the door for two streaming deals that while not financially as large as what would have been garnered through a full ESPN renewal, it does provide additional revenue above the 17% for linear television. Per Forbes colleague Michael Ozanian, the total value of the two come in at $115 million annually with a $55 million rights fee and $30 million worth of advertising for the doubleheader games on Fridays with Apple and $30 million annually with NBC’s Peacock.

New Or Renewed League Sponsors

Major League Baseball continues to get creative in the league sponsorship space, growing its portfolio of partners. While Bank of America did not renew, a new partner came in to replace it. The following are new sponsors for 2022. While financial terms are not available for all, the change to Capital One is worth a reported $125 million over five years.

Capital One (replaces BofA)

Dairy Queen (Official Treat of MLB)

Mattress Firm (Official Sleep Wellness Partner)

Corona (Official Cerveza Of Major League Baseball)

Cue Health (COVID testing)

Candy Digital (NFT collectibles)

Why The Total Will Meet Or Exceed $11 Billion

According to CNBC, total sponsorship revenue rose from $1 billion in 2020 to $1.7 billion in 2021. MLB still can strike a helmet decal deal for the 2022 postseason. Overall, the league should see a sizable boost in gate revenue over 2021 as many ballparks were under pandemic capacity restrictions. And ESPN will pick up additional postseason games as the league and MLBPA agreed to expand the number of playoff teams from 10 to 12. Throw in all that, plus the increase in media rights, plus deals for each of the 30 clubs, and all things point to Major League Baseball meeting or surpassing $11 billion in gross revenues for 2022.