Postseason TV: What an International Viewer Sees

The United States is inarguably a better country from which to follow major-league baseball than France. “For a lot of reasons,” is the answer. “Why, precisely?” is the question.

That said, it would appear as though, so far as consuming postseason baseball is concerned, there’s actually some advantage to living abroad. The reader perhaps already has some notion of why — namely because, while MLB.TV viewers in US and Canada are relegated merely to “companion coverage” of the divisional series and NLCS, international users have unfettered access to the live television feed for every game. The logic of this arrangement is not immediately obvious to the author, although one guesses “cash money” has something to do with it.

Below are five representative screenshots from an international viewer’s experience of MLB.TV’s postseason coverage. (Click any image to embiggen.)

1. Here’s the Media Center page, with notes (circled in red) regarding the options for US/Canada users versus international ones:

2. After clicking Watch on the above screen, the international user is brought here, another screen indicating the difference between the international and domestic viewing options:

3. Here’s a screenshot of the game — i.e., what any viewer of TBS would see:

4. Here’s a second screenshot of the game — one which documents how the Cardinals scored seven runs just while the author was completing this post:

5. Finally, here’s an attempt by the government to interrupt the international viewer’s postseason baseball experience with classics of the French New Wave: