Menu
Download the app

SBJ subscribers – Enhance your experience with the revamped iOS app

Marketing and Sponsorship

T-Mobile Signs Three-Year Deal With MLB That Will See Cells Replace Dugout Phones

T-Mobile, the country's fourth-largest wireless carrier, has signed a major three-year sponsorship with MLB and its teams that also includes extensive rights with MLBAM, giving baseball its first league-level telecommunications sponsorship deal in nearly 15 years. Perhaps most notable to fans and team managers, the deal brings the advent of mobile phones in MLB dugouts to call bullpens. The complex deal, pegged by industry sources to be worth about $125M over the three years, will give teams one of three choices with regard to the dugout phones: participate fully with T-Mobile branded docking stations, use an unbranded wireless system with an MLB logo, or not participate at all. The Giants and Yankees, deeply aligned with AT&T, and the White Sox, partnered with U.S. Cellular, are expected to select the latter choice and opt out entirely. Additionally, T-Mobile will work extensively with MLBAM across the league to boost in-venue fan connectivity, a major issue across the entire sports industry and one baseball has put more focus on over the past year. T-Mobile through MLBAM also will gain access to exclusive pieces of digital baseball content and conduct various co-marketing initiatives. The league, MLBAM and T-Mobile announced the deal last night at the Int'l Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, with participating baseball figures including MLB Exec VP/Business Tim Brosnan, MLB Exec VP/Business Operations Joe Torre, MLBAM Exec VP/Revenue Noah Garden and Nationals RF Bryce Harper. MLB execs described the deal as without rival in the sport with regard to its scope covering both business and baseball operations. "The technological challenges on this deal were huge," Brosnan said. "This is a story of everyone working together to deliver a new asset that would attract a new and important wireless partner after years of chasing one." T-Mobile VP/Media & Sponsorships Mike Belcher added, "We needed a property that could showcase our technology, and the different parties worked to build us a new asset that could achieve that." The new On-Field Communication Systems will use dedicated cell antennas. Genesco Sports Enterprises helped negotiate the deal for T-Mobile and will assist in marketing plans, which will include top-level branding in the MLB Fan Cave.

LONG TIME COMING: MLB last held a league-level telecom sponsorship with MCI in the late '90s. Since then, the wireless category has become an important revenue source for every other sports property. But without joint rights from MLBAM, a deal combining technology and marketing rights could not happen. Marketers have privately discussed for years their frustrations working through the varied cultures of MLB and MLBAM to strike deals. But baseball execs said solving their telecom riddle should send a strong signal to the marketplace. "This was 100 percent collaborative from Day 1," Garden said. "We've been working together (with MLB) for some time, but yes, I do think this makes a statement to the market."

SBJ Morning Buzzcast: March 25, 2024

NFL meeting preview; MLB's opening week ad effort and remembering Peter Angelos.

Big Get Jay Wright, March Madness is upon us and ESPN locks up CFP

On this week’s pod, our Big Get is CBS Sports college basketball analyst Jay Wright. The NCAA Championship-winning coach shares his insight with SBJ’s Austin Karp on key hoops issues and why being well dressed is an important part of his success. Also on the show, Poynter Institute senior writer Tom Jones shares who he has up and who is down in sports media. Later, SBJ’s Ben Portnoy talks the latest on ESPN’s CFP extension and who CBS, TNT Sports and ESPN need to make deep runs in the men’s and women's NCAA basketball tournaments.

SBJ I Factor: Nana-Yaw Asamoah

SBJ I Factor features an interview with AMB Sports and Entertainment Chief Commercial Office Nana-Yaw Asamoah. Asamoah, who moved over to AMBSE last year after 14 years at the NFL, talks with SBJ’s Ben Fischer about how his role model parents and older sisters pushed him to shrive, how the power of lifelong learning fuels successful people, and why AMBSE was an opportunity he could not pass up. Asamoah is 2021 SBJ Forty Under 40 honoree. SBJ I Factor is a monthly podcast offering interviews with sports executives who have been recipients of one of the magazine’s awards.

Shareable URL copied to clipboard!

https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Daily/Issues/2013/01/09/Marketing-and-Sponsorship/TMobile.aspx

Sorry, something went wrong with the copy but here is the link for you.

https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Daily/Issues/2013/01/09/Marketing-and-Sponsorship/TMobile.aspx

CLOSE