Breaking: Roku to Air Sunday Morning Major League Baseball Games Starting This Week
For 18 Sundays, Roku will broadcast Major League Baseball games for free across its streaming devices and app.
During the 2022 and 2023 Major League Baseball seasons, an exclusive slate of Sunday morning games streamed exclusively on Peacock. However, when the schedule for the 2024 season was announced, there were no games assigned to the NBCUniversal streamer. Then, a few weeks into the season, reports began to circulate that the free, ad-supported Roku Channel streaming platform was interested in taking over the package. Now, that interest has become a reality as it was announced on Monday that the “Sunday Leadoff” slate of games will begin airing on Roku starting this week, on Sunday, May 19.
Key Details:
- Roku will take over the early Sunday game package that Peacock had owned for the past two seasons.
- All of the games will be available on The Roku Channel for free without blackout restrictions.
- The games will be available to stream on Roku devices and smart TVs, as well as via the Roku app on many other streaming devices.
The new Roku version of “Sunday Leadoff” will begin this weekend when the Boston Red Sox visit the St. Louis Cardinals. Though when the package of games was on Peacock, first pitch was almost always in the morning, this weekend’s first Roku game is scheduled to begin at 1:05 p.m. ET on May 19, with others also beginning at the same time, and others beginning as late as 4:10 p.m. ET. In total, the package will include 18 games available on the Roku Channel, with 10 starting before or right around 12 noon ET. The games will run weekly through Sept. 15 when the Cincinnati Reds will take on the Minnesota Twins at 1:05 p.m. ET.
“As television programming, live sports, and the leagues have fragmented across networks, apps, and multiple packages, Roku—home to all of them—plays an increasingly crucial role for viewers and advertisers,” Roku president Charlie Collier said. “With this deal, Roku delivers free, live, weekly Sunday baseball and 24/7 baseball curation, destinations, and channels across our platform. The lead-in to all of television is now the lead-off for Sunday baseball as well. It’s a terrific partnership.”
Unlike Peacock or Apple TV+, which exclusively broadcasts a pair of MLB games every Friday night, baseball fans will not need to subscribe to a specific streaming service to watch the games, and despite what the Roku exclusivity might lead you to believe, you don’t need to own a Roku streaming device to watch either. The Sunday morning games will be blackout-free on both the Roku Channel and baseball’s traditionally out-of-market streaming service MLB.TV.
To watch on MLB.TV, you must be a subscriber, but the Roku Channel is free to cord-cutters who have a Roku TV or streaming device as well as via the Roku app, which is available on most major streaming platforms, including Amazon Fire TV, Google Chromecast, Roku, Android TV, iPhone/iPad, Android Phone/Tablet, Mac, Windows, LG Smart TV, Samsung Smart TV, Sony Smart TV, and VIZIO Smart TV.
“With free games available to anyone, MLB games on Roku will be widely accessible to fans,” MLB deputy commissioner for business and media Noah Garden said. “Since Roku serves as an entertainment gateway for millions, this partnership offers a valuable new promotional and distribution platform for MLB games and content.”
Roku will welcome in broadcast teams from the home market every week; this Sunday, it will feature the Cardinals’ play-by-play announcer Chip Caray (play-by-play), alongside analyst Will Middlebrooks and reporter Alexa Datt.
Following the first quarter of 2024, Roku reported having 81.6 million households using its platform for a combined 30.8 billion streaming hours. The Roku operating system was also the No. 1 selling TV OS in both the U.S. and Mexico, thanks to its near ubiquity on streaming devices and smart TVs. While there has long been a concern that moving MLB games to streaming would upset and confuse the tradition-beholden and change-averse baseball audience, Roku is arguably the most accessible streaming platform, both in terms of availability and price.
What is Roku’s Schedule of MLB ‘Sunday Leadoff’ Games?
Roku Channel
The Roku Channel is a free live TV streaming service that provides 350+ live linear streaming channels and more than 80,000 free movies and TV shows. The library contains entertainment from several different decades, including some major hits.