MLB Network brings postseason to fans around the world

MLB Network just brought postseason baseball to a global audience like never before.

In a full day of Division Series action on Saturday, MLB Network put on seven different game broadcasts, covering all four playoff games, for fans around the world -- from the U.S. to Europe to India.

All four Division Series games -- Rangers-Orioles, Twins-Astros, Phillies-Braves and D-backs-Dodgers -- were broadcast for the BBC in England. The two National League games featured Spanish-language broadcasts for U.S. viewers. And the Phillies-Braves game was broadcast in India on STAR India.

• ALDS Game 2, presented by Booking.com: Sunday, 4 ET and 8 ET on FS1

"It's for the fan," MLB Network senior vice president of production Marc Caiafa said. "In each respective country, whether it's England or India or for our Spanish-speaking audience here in America, we just want to make sure they're getting the essence of what the game is about."

The whole operation was anchored out of the MLB Network studios in Secaucus, N.J., an unprecedented day of games for the Network. Every single studio was in use for the seven game broadcasts. Hundreds of people were involved in the production.

"There's just a lot of buzz in the building. It's fun," said MLB Network VP of live events Chris Pfeiffer. "I think it's exciting for our viewers around the world to get a really good taste of our game."

The day started with the Rangers beating the Orioles in the first of the four BBC games, which were broadcast March Madness-style out of MLB Network's Studio 21, with a diverse announcing team: O's broadcaster Melanie Newman, MLB Network's Xavier Scruggs and Felix White for the BBC.

"It's been really cool to see a lot of the British fans reaching out to us on social media, and they're telling us where they have watch parties set up, or that they're going to be out at all these pubs after work watching it," said Newman, who was also one of the commentators on BBC for the London Series this season.

"We've given them some of the biggest historical rivals. We've shown Red Sox-Yankees, we've shown Cardinals-Cubs. That was in their own backyard. Now it's a chance to elevate into the playoffs, and that's just as special as some of those rivalries. I think for fans who are still maybe looking for a team to even identify with as a fan, this could be that moment for them."

Putting on the BBC broadcasts involved not just multiple announcing crews splitting the games in Studio 21 -- MLB Network's Robert Flores and Jake Peavy joined White for two of the games -- but also two auxiliary Game Creek Nitro video trucks brought in by MLB Network outside the studio to help transmit the games.

"It's a unique opportunity for us to take the two sides of MLB Network -- our remote side and our studio side -- and create a single entity out of those two groups to really push the game for our emerging fanbases," said MLB Network senior director of remote technical operations Jason Hedgcock. "If you're trying to pick who's going to showcase baseball to emerging fanbases in India, the U.K., or anywhere, using the level of expertise that we have here really helps drive that product home."

The BBC broadcasts of MLB postseason games -- which will also include continue through the playoffs, including World Series Game 1 -- are capping off a year of growth for baseball in England, which started with Great Britain playing in the World Baseball Classic and included the return of the London Series for the first time since 2019.

"This is the pinnacle event of what's been a really significant year for us," said MLB Europe managing director Ben Ladkin, who was at MLB Network on Saturday to help supervise the BBC broadcasts. "What we want to do is just let people immerse themselves over the course of the day. It's the most ambitious thing we've done with the BBC, who have been great partners of ours in terms of trying to build the game."

While the BBC broadcast was ongoing throughout the day at the studio, the domestic Spanish-language broadcasts on MLB Network went live for the two late games, as the Braves hosted the Phillies and the Dodgers hosted the D-backs in the two NLDS Game 1s.

Those broadcasts, which will also continue throughout the National League Division Series and League Championship Series, feature veteran MLB Network announcing teams, with Fernando Álvarez, Candy Maldonado, Carlos Peña, Yonder Alonso and Clemson Smith Muñiz all calling games from the MLB Network studios.

"When we're on air calling the games in Spanish, I get to share my love for the game, my observations and my insight and experience with the Latino community, with the Spanish-speaking community, in our own native language," Peña said. "To be able to share that love for the game with the Latino, Spanish-speaking audience, is definitely an honor and a privilege. I don't take it lightly at all. And it's a huge responsibility as well. Because the audience is so knowledgeable about the game of baseball, that it really inspires me to bring my best."

MLB Network reaching a global audience with its seven-game day doesn't just mean broadcasting on international TV stations like the BBC or STAR India. The Spanish-language broadcasts that reach fans in the U.S. who might have a Latin American background are also a part of that effort.

"That's the great thing about the Spanish-language broadcasts -- they're providing for domestic U.S. fans who may be Spanish-speaking only, they now have access to a game that's native Spanish with Spanish graphics, here available on U.S. providers," Hedgcock said.

Hedgcock was involved in two months of planning, just on the technical side, that went into producing this one day of games at the Network studios. Saturday saw all that planning come to fruition.

One of the more unique aspects of MLB Network's day of international postseason baseball was the Phillies-Braves telecast for STAR India. MLB and MLB Network has partnered with STAR India to show a few other Major League games this season, but the first postseason broadcast marks continued growth in bringing the sport to India.

The setup for the STAR India broadcasts is different than the BBC or Spanish Language broadcasts. Play-by-play announcer Jacob Wilkins is in studio at MLB Network -- yet another studio filled up on Saturday -- but analysts Tejas Goradia, Manish Batavia and Aayush Sharma are all in India.

To connect all the separate broadcasters and the television feed itself, MLB Network is using cloud company Spalk.

"Our technical team is so creative with the innovations they're able to find in order to do this. And they love it. You give them a challenge, and they're all-in," said MLB Network SVP of operations and engineering Susan Stone. "What gets us all excited is exposing new markets to the game and playing a part in growing the game abroad. But also the team and community that we've created here, and that we're able to translate that into making a pretty huge undertaking successful."

The profile of Major League Baseball in India is growing larger than ever -- the Blue Jays drafting Arjun Nimmala, who's of Indian descent, in the first round this year was an important event to that effect -- and the MLB Network broadcasts through STAR India will hopefully only add to that.

"Making baseball available to fans in the Indian market is key in our efforts to increase accessibility," MLB India's Ryo Takahashi said. "To be able to do it with a specialized broadcast allows us to connect on a deeper level with the audience."

On the one hand, MLB Network's postseason broadcasts on Saturday for fans in India and England and Latin American fans in the U.S. is only one small part of Major League Baseball's efforts to grow the game globally. But on the other hand, if you were there in Secaucus on Saturday, you could see how big the effort to produce all those games really was.

"It begins and ends with the games, obviously, and showcasing them," Caiafa said. "But for the place, it's incredible. It's incredible to know that we're responsible for getting all this stuff out.

"Our little place here in Secaucus -- which really isn't so little -- the fact that it's doing it for so many different markets, and now so many different countries, it's special."