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ESPN airing Korea Baseball Organization games starting May 5

Yahoo Finance's Dan Roberts breaks down the latest in the sports world, including ESPN's new exclusive — Korean baseball games.

Video Transcript

AKIKO FUJITA: Let's do a big pivot here and talk about sports because baseball season is starting again, but not here in the US. We're talking about Korean baseball, and the reason we're talking about that is because there's no sports to watch here in the US. I want to bring in Dan Roberts for this conversation. Dan, ESPN, not sure they were always interested in Korean baseball, but certainly, you know, a lot of fans out there are just seeking out any sports they can watch. And right now, we're just looking at the Taiwanese Baseball League and the Korean Baseball League.

DAN ROBERTS: Yeah, it-- it is a weird time to think that a Korean baseball rights deal is such a big win for ESPN, but that's the reality we're in, right? I mean, every US sports league is shut down. And-- and by the way, it's worth mentioning, this fact has gotten a lot of attention, but South Korea and the US had their first reported cases of coronavirus on the same date, on January 20. And obviously, those two countries took a very different turn in terms of how their curves went. We can kind of shelve that conversation for now.

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The point being that the return of baseball in-- in South Korea is sort of an interesting study in contrast for US sports fans because, wow, Korea gets to have baseball again, but in America we don't. But ESPN getting the deal to broadcast those games live. ESPN will have six games a week. Now, they're in very kind of strange times because of the time difference. You know, these games are going to air live on ESPN2, some of them at 4:30 in the morning, some of them at 1:00 AM. But obviously, the games will also be on the ESPN app, so you can log into that with a cable authentication.

And, you know, I think the key here is it's not just that ESPN gets to broadcast the games, it gives all of ESPN's kind of channels and talent something to talk about because ESPN also gets rights to show replays from any games, not just the ones that aired. You know, ESPN becomes the kind of exclusive English language broadcaster of the KBO, and I think you'll see "Sportscenter" showing highlights. I mean, there isn't much else to show. So I imagine that ESPN is really going to latch on to these rights.

And what's interesting is, there were reports just a couple weeks ago that ESPN had failed to get the rights because it tried to get them for free. So obviously, this deal coming together really at the 11th hour, because it was announced today, and the Korean Baseball Organization starts up again tomorrow. And by the way, these games will be played with no fans in the parks, but KBO has gotten used to this. You know, the-- the baseball league there has been doing this the whole month of April with no fans. They're testing players, taking their temperatures twice a day.

And also, there is a no spitting rule. The players cannot spit. The KBO has also said that if there is a case among players, it will probably have to shut down for three weeks. So fingers crossed that won't happen. But this is the reality we're in. And you can also bet that MLB, Major League Baseball here in the US, is going to be watching what the KBO does very, very closely. The latest from MLB is that they're targeting late June to try to start their season, but we'll see.

AKIKO FUJITA: I was going to say, Dan, are they-- are the leagues talking to each other? I mean, obviously, the, you know, MLB is going to be looking at the success or-- or how KBO is going to be able to ease this in. Are the leagues across countries talking to each other about how, you know, maybe exchanging some ideas on how they're going about resuming these games?

DAN ROBERTS: I think they're definitely watching each other closely. I don't know how much they're talking. You know, MLB does have some deals and partnerships in places like Japan and overseas, so I'm sure that they've talked to the people from the KBO. I would say that right now, there's probably a different map for every different US sports league. You know, there was a lot of optimistic talk about, oh, maybe come fall we suddenly have every sport going on at once-- NBA, MLB, NHL, football.

I don't know how realistic that is. We're going to see it, especially because of broadcasting schedules. You know, the NFL right now is insisting that it's going to be able to start its season on time in September, and that may be. And one thing the NFL has going for it is it's not as reliant on ticket sales. So the NFL could start up without fans because so much of the NFL's point is the broadcasting.

College football doesn't have that luxury, especially because if you start college football with no fans, you're basically giving up on the-- the claim of amateurism. Now you're admitting it's-- it's a business. And also, to do college sports if the colleges themselves don't have students there, I don't see how you can do that. So college sports are reliant on whether the colleges come back on time. I think the first thing to come back might be major league baseball late summer, or it might be the NFL in the fall.

AKIKO FUJITA: No NBA, huh?

DAN ROBERTS: I'm not that optimistic about it. You know, if just one staff member, whether it's a player, a janitor, a coach, gets it, you shut down again. So it's-- it's very hard to imagine that working.