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Xfinity drops Bally Sports Detroit: How you can still watch Detroit Tigers gamers

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8 months ago

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Xfinity drops Bally Sports Detroit: How you can still watch Detroit Tigers gamers

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If you have Xfinity and you’re trying to watch the Detroit Tigers, you likely have to find some other options.

Diamond Sports Group, which operates all of the 18 Bally Sports regional channels, and Comcast could not come to a new carrier agreement before Tuesday’s deadline, leaving tens of thousands of Michigan customers in the dark for coverage of local Major League Baseball and, if things aren’t resolved over the next few months, NHL and NBA games.

Bally Sports Detroit is one of the few channels that has in-market streaming available via the Bally Sports+ app. BSD is also still available on DirecTV and FUBO. For those outside of the state of Michigan, MLB.tv is still an option for Tigers games.

“It’s disappointing that Comcast rejected a proposed extension that would have kept our channels on the air and that Comcast indicated that it intends to pull the signals, preventing fans from watching their favorite local teams,” Diamond Sports said in a statement released Tuesday night. “Comcast has refused to engage in substantive discussions despite Diamond offering terms similar to those reached with much larger distributors of ours. We are a fans-first company and will continue to seek an agreement with Comcast to restore broadcasts, and at this critical juncture for Diamond, we hope that Comcast will recognize the important and mutually beneficial role Diamond and RSNs play in the media ecosystem.

Last year, Comcast reported it had a little under 15 million cable subscribers in the country, though trends indicate “cord-cutting” has cut into all traditional cable services for years.

Diamond Sports had been on the brink of extinction in recent years, filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and having MLB take over the production and distribution for two teams last season. In January, news broke that Amazon would partner with Diamond Sports to carry its channels, though that move has yet to be approved by the bankruptcy courts.

“We have been very flexible with Diamond Sports Group for months as they work through their bankruptcy proceedings, providing them with an extension on the Bally Sports Regional Networks last fall and a unilateral right to extend the term for another year, which they opted to not exercise,” Comcast said in a statement Tuesday night. “We’d like to continue carrying their networks, but they have declined multiple offers and now we no longer have the rights to this programming. We will proactively credit our customers for the costs associated with them — most will automatically receive $8 to 10 per month in credits.”

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