Major League Baseball vs Kicker

MLB's 'No Time Like October' Playoffs Campaign Boosts Ratings

Major League Baseball launched its 2026 postseason campaign, 'No Time Like October,' featuring full-page ads in major newspapers declaring 'October Starts Today.' The campaign aims to build urgency and excitement around the playoffs, which are experiencing a ratings boost. The league's marketing strategy focuses on disrupting daily routines and emphasizing the unmissable nature of playoff moments. This move is part of a broader effort to engage fans and drive viewership across traditional and streaming platforms.

• MLB launched the 'No Time Like October' campaign for the 2026 playoffs.
• Full-page ads ran in The New York Times and LA Times in late September.
• The campaign tagline is 'No Time Like October'.

X expands Gametime sports hub beyond NFL with MLB

X has announced the expansion of its 'Gametime' feature, a sports hub previously focused on the NFL, to include Major League Baseball (MLB). The new MLB experience, launching this month, will offer baseball fans postseason coverage, scores, stats, and real-time discussions. This move is part of X's strategy to attract advertisers by capitalizing on engaged sports audiences. The company plans to add more leagues, including the NBA, to make Gametime a year-round destination. The announcement comes after X's settlement with the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) over an alleged boycott, as X seeks to rebuild relationships with brands.

• X expands its 'Gametime' sports hub to include Major League Baseball (MLB), starting this month.
• The MLB experience on X will offer postseason coverage, scores, stats, and real-time discussions.
• X plans to add more leagues, including the NBA, to make Gametime a year-round destination.

MLB Local Media Strategy Post-Cable Shift

This article discusses Major League Baseball's (MLB) challenge of maintaining its local media business as traditional cable (RSNs) declines. The league has agreed to a three-year national rights deal with Peacock, Netflix, and ESPN before the 2026 season, moving away from ESPN after 39 years. MLB is taking back local rights from collapsed networks like FanDuel Sports Network, offering short-term solutions via MLB.TV. Commissioner Rob Manfred envisions a unified streaming package for all teams, which could generate more revenue than individual team deals. However, big-market teams like the Dodgers, Yankees, and Red Sox have lucrative existing local rights deals (e.g., Dodgers' $500M/year with Charter), creating a revenue gap with small-market teams. International stars like Shohei Ohtani also complicate revenue sharing. The article suggests teams should build direct fan relationships and diversified revenue streams during the three-year transition period.

• MLB signed a three-year national rights deal with Peacock, Netflix, and ESPN before the 2026 season.
• MLB is shifting away from ESPN after 39 seasons for national games.
• The Dodgers' local rights deal with Charter Communications tops $500 million annually by 2038.

Podcast-Powerplay: kicker und Eishockey NEWS holen Moritz Seider und Tim Stützle ans Mikrofon

Exklusiver Podcast mit zwei deutschen NHL-Stars: kicker und Eishockey NEWS starten einen Podcast mit Moritz Seider und Tim Stützle.

How kicker Integrates Editorial Standards and Brand Partnerships

In a podcast interview with turi2, kicker's Sales Director Lukas Ringer and Editorial Director Tobias Goldbrunner discussed how the sports publisher successfully balances journalistic integrity with advertising. Rather than implementing quick, low-value ad integrations, kicker prioritizes high-quality branded content that delivers real value to readers. Despite the early exit of the German national team during the World Cup, kicker generated over 3 billion pageviews by offering deep, analytical coverage. Ringer emphasized that local and regional league results provide highly targeted, valuable audiences for advertisers, and expressed confidence in their monetization strategy despite broader industry concerns about shrinking advertising budgets.

• kicker recorded over 3 billion pageviews on its website during the World Cup period.
• Sales Director Lukas Ringer stated that kicker avoids simple logo-slapping integrations in favor of high-quality branded content.
• The publisher leverages regional and local league data to offer highly targeted audience segments to advertisers.

ARD Opens Bundesliga Audio Streams to External Partners

ARD will make its live audio reports from Bundesliga stadiums available on external media partner platforms starting with the 2026/27 season. Until now the Sportschau live commentaries were limited to ARD channels such as ARD Sounds and Sportschau.de. The expansion allows selected external publishers — named in the report as kicker, RND and Bundesliga — to carry the live audiostreams. The change broadens distribution of ARD's football audio content across third-party sites and apps. The report was published by Horizont on 2026-08-25 (author: David Hein).

• ARD will allow external media partners to publish live Bundesliga audiostreams starting in the 2026/27 season.
• Named external partners in the article are kicker, RND and Bundesliga.
• Previously, the Sportschau live reports were available only on ARD platforms like ARD Sounds and Sportschau.de.