Rangers glad to have Rangers Sports Network following recent FanDuel Sports update

FanDuel Sports Network (formerly Bally Sports) finds themselves in another spat with nine Major League Baseball teams surrounding uncertainty about their parent company, Main Street Sports Group.

This story might sound familiar to Texas Rangers' fans, as Texas recently ended their contract with the following the 2024 season as the broadcast company was in the middle of bankruptcy proceedings and missing payments and cost the Rangers nearly $16 million in revenue.

From their the team's broadcast partner was uncertain until they introduced their own media company, Rangers Sports Network (RSN) in January 2025.

Rangers Sports Network means organization is far removed from reoccuring TV broadcast mess

On Thursday, nine MLB teams (Atlanta Braves, Cincinnati Reds, Detroit Tigers, Kansas City Royals, Los Angeles Angels, Miami Marlins, Milwaukee Brewers, St. Louis Cardinals and Tampa Bay Rays) terminated their contracts with Main Street and now their broadcast future hangs in the balance.

It's another edition in a long-line of question marks surrounding broadcasting rights for MLB teams. Right now, the league currently holds the rights to the seven teams after they left Bally Sports. That means the league controls the broadcast, distribution and streaming rights.

When RSN was introduced prior to spring training last season, fans were cautious. All they wanted was a platform that would guarantee access to games regardless of what cable or streaming service they owned.

While RSN is not available to all services, the Rangers did also partner with streaming company Victory+ to give all fans within the team's coverage area access via their app. While that app did have technical difficulties throughout the year, hopefully it can be improved.

Revenue of RSN still unknown but trends, viewership is positive

When the 2025 season ended, numbers were mere speculation and didn't show the true potential impact owning their own network could have on a team's revenue. Although those early indications show that it hadn't yet eclipsed the $95 million payout from Bally for the 2024 season.

However, what it did do was increase viewership across the board, which is what fans were mostly concerned about. According to Nielsen ratings, RSN viewership saw an increase of 37 percent over the 2024 average in Dallas-Fort Worth households while Victory+ averaged just over 100,000 viewers per game.

As can be told through owner Ray Davis's attempt to remain below the $200 million mark in payroll and avoid the $244 million luxury tax threshold, the revenue from RSN is not yet increasing the team's spending power.