Cardinals boost ways to watch game telecasts in 2025

There will be more ways than ever to watch Cardinals baseball this season.

The question is: How many people will want to tune in, with low expectations and little buzz for a team that made no marquee improvements to its roster after finishing 10 games out of first place in its division — in a season marked with tumbling attendance and record-low television ratings?

How to watch ��ѿ��ý Cardinals games in 2025. A rundown of options and prices.

But in a fan-friendly move, the Cardinals have addressed key TV distribution issues that have led to grumbling for years from Redbirds rooters who wanted to watch but faced roadblocks:

Several key programming distributors — such as Dish Network, YouTube TV, Hulu with Live TV and Altice — have not been carrying FanDuel Sports Network (formerly Bally Sports Midwest), the outlet that produces and shows the team’s local television package.
Some fans who wanted to watch the telecasts via streaming were unable to do so because a subscription to a programming provider that showed the games was required.
Others who lived in an area that was considered in another team’s geographic territory were blacked out of Cardinals telecasts there.

The team has taken several steps to not only address those deficiencies but to also make a few of their local telecasts available to an even wider audience via over-the-air (“free”) TV.

So while the previous options to watch Cardinals telecasts remains — they still will be carried on what now is FanDuel on cable, satellite and streaming services — FanDuel will sell streaming of the contests directly for the first time this season. In addition, that package is to be available in the team’s geographical territory, which previously had been subject to blackouts because of overlaps with other clubs’ regions.

FanDuel cites Iowa as an example:

“Iowa is part of the TV territory for six teams: Cardinals, Royals, Cubs, White Sox, Brewers and Twins. Some providers in Iowa carry FanDuel Sports Network Midwest, some carry the Cubs channel, some carry the White Sox channel (and) some carry more than one regional sports network. Now, fans in those areas will be able to subscribe directly to stream the Cardinals (and Royals and Brewers) through FanDuel Sports Network, regardless of whether their TV provider carries our channel or not.”

It should be noted that the direct-to-consumer streaming option from FanDuel is available only in the team’s geographical footprint. Outside that, Cards streaming will be offered in the package.

The Cardinals are touting the expanded array of options to see their games as the best of multiple worlds.

“We have significantly improved the reach of our games this season,” said Anuk Karunaratne, the team’s senior vice president of business operations. “From adding a streaming option, to eliminating local market blackouts and the introduction of free over-the-air games, more of our fans across our entire television territory will be able to watch Cardinals baseball this season than ever before.”

Free streaming trial

Three levels of the direct-to-consumer streaming service are being offered — $19.99 per month, $99.99 for the full season or $189.99 for a calendar year. The packages entail all FanDuel programming available in the customer’s ZIP code, which in the ��ѿ��ý area includes Blues and some Memphis and Indiana NBA games.

Purchase information is at the website, and a 30-day free trial is available. The code to use for that is CARDS30DAY.

Also this season, at least 10 Cardinals contests are set to be shown over the air, on KMOV (Channel 4) and/or Matrix Midwest (Channel 32), games that also are to be carried on FanDuel. This will be the first time since 2010 that broadcast TV will be part of the club’s local television offerings and six telecasts in that package have been announced thus far. Those are on Friday nights, beginning April 11 with a home game against Philadelphia.

KMOV and Matrix are owned by Gray Media, which also plans to show those contests over the air in other markets it’s on in the Cardinals’ TV region. That was an appealing aspect for the club.

The bottom line

But while the new array of viewing options is good for fans, it’s the byproduct of the massive decline in recent years of regional sports networks such as FanDuel. That outlet’s parent company was involved in a bankruptcy case that wore on for more than a year and a half before finally being resolved last fall.

The Cardinals could have gone elsewhere with their telecasts this season but elected to stay despite a significant reduction in rights fees (from about $75 million from what they were owed under the old deal to slightly under $58 million in the renegotiated arrangement) despite the addition of direct-to-consumer streaming and over-the-air telecasts. But in so doing they went with a familiar-to-fans distributor while also adding more choices, and Karunaratne has emphasized through the process that the club still considers cable TV to be an important component of its broadcast portfolio.

“The existing model is still robust,” he has said. “I don’t think despite what some people say that it’s going away in the near term. ... We just need to provide options for people. We no longer have one dominant medium for viewing games.”

There eventually could be more modifications.

“If we identify any opportunities to further improve upon the changes we have made this year, we will look to address them,” he said.

The key takeaway for fans who have been shut out of Cardinals telecasts is that they now should have access if they so desire to watch.

This article is part of the ��ѿ��ý Cardinals season preview section, which will be in print on Sunday, March 23.