MASN
Mid-Atlantic Sports Network is an American regional sports network owned as a joint venture between two Major League Baseball franchises, the Baltimore Orioles and the Washington Nationals. Headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, the channel broadcasts regional coverage of sports events in the Washington, D.C., and Baltimore metropolitan areas.
MASN is available on approximately 23 cable and fiber optic television providers in Maryland, the District of Columbia, Virginia, eastern and central North Carolina, West Virginia, south central Pennsylvania and Delaware ; it is also available nationwide on satellite via DirecTV.
History
When the Montreal Expos relocated to Washington, D.C., in 2004 to begin play as the Nationals in 2005, issues arose regarding television rights for the new franchise. The Orioles have had a sizable following in the Washington area since moving from St. Louis in 1954, and have claimed Washington as part of their home territory since the second Washington Senators franchise became the Texas Rangers in 1972. Since at least 1981, Major League Baseball had designated the Orioles' television territory as extending from Harrisburg to Charlotte. The Orioles agreed to share their home territory with the Nationals in return for the ability to air Nationals games on the Orioles' planned regional sports network, to be named the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network. Major League Baseball, which owned the Expos-Nationals franchise from 2002 to 2006, paid the Orioles $75 million for a 10% stake in MASN, with the Orioles maintaining a controlling interest of 90%. As part of the deal, the Nationals' stake in the network would increase by one percent per year to 33% over 23 years, at which point the increases would cease and ownership would be fixed at 67% Orioles and 33% Nationals. Under the arrangement, MASN paid the Nationals $20 million to broadcast their games in 2005, and were bound to renegotiate the amount they paid the Nationals based on the fair market value of the Nationals′ broadcast rights in 2012 and once every five years thereafter. With this settled, the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network launched on April 4, 2005.The family of Lerner Enterprises founder Ted Lerner subsequently became part-owners in MASN after their purchase of the Washington Nationals in July 2006. The same month that the Lerners acquired minority interest in MASN, the network, which originally broadcast only during Orioles and Nationals games, converted into a 24-hour channel with an expanded roster of collegiate sports events and local and national programming. It has become a strong competitor to the area's dominant regional sports network, Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic, now known as Monumental Sports Network.
On March 3, 2025, the Orioles and Nationals reached a settlement to end the teams dispute over television rights fee payments. MASN, which is owned and operated by the Orioles but airs both teams games, pays rights fees to the Nationals. Through the settlement, the Nationals' agreement with the Orioles and MASN will end following the 2025 season.
Programming
As a whole, the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network televises more than 600 professional and NCAA Division I collegiate events annually.Orioles and Nationals telecasts
The network carries live telecasts of all Orioles and Nationals games that are not televised by a national broadcast or cable network, and produces the pre-game and post-game shows Nats Xtra and O's Xtra, which bookend the game telecasts. As with all Major League Baseball broadcasts, MASN-produced games are available for streaming out of the teams' respective territories at MLB.tv, with local viewers able to watch highlights for a certain amount of time following the conclusion of each game.Because the Orioles and Nationals play many games at or around the same time of day, MASN operates a second network, MASN2, which serves as an overflow channel when there are scheduling conflicts. Every cable and satellite provider that receives MASN receives MASN2 as well., MASN scheduled each baseball team to play the same number of games on each network. According to MASN's website, the schedule for which team will play on which network on a given day is set before the season begins. For Beltway Series games, the home team's regular broadcast crew covers the game on MASN and the visiting team's broadcast crew covers the game on MASN2.
For the 2026 season, Nationals broadcasts will move away from MASN to Major League Baseball's centralized model.
Production history
Through the 2017 season, MASN also produced over-the-air television broadcasts of Nationals and Orioles games for television stations in their respective primary markets – producing Nationals games seen on CBS affiliate WUSA-TV in Washington and Orioles games seen on CBS owned-and-operated station WJZ-TV in Baltimore. Those games were shown on MASN in all of the network's territory, including the Baltimore and Washington markets.From 2008 through 2013, MASN used five broadcasters to provide simultaneous coverage of the annual Beltway Series between the Orioles and the Nationals, using the network's on-air staffs in an unconventional "mixed-booth" arrangement whenever the Orioles and Nationals played one another. Each team was represented by a color analyst and two sideline reporters for their respective telecasts, with play-by-play announcers each broadcasting for half of the game. The games were simulcast on both MASN channels. Beginning in 2014, MASN dropped the mixed-booth format and returned to producing separate Orioles and Nationals broadcasts for the games as normal.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, MASN did not send its commentators to away games since the 2020 Major League Baseball season, with all games being broadcast remotely from booths at Camden Yards or Nationals Park. This persisted into the beginning of the 2022 season, even with almost all other MLB broadcasters having transitioned back to on-site broadcasts; a MASN spokesperson stated that "The global pandemic required all of us to learn new lessons in innovation, resourcefulness, and resilience. MASN is carrying forward some of those lessons." The remark was interpreted by a Washington Post writer as an implication that this was for budgetary reasons. On April 26, it was reported that MASN had reversed the decision.
College sports
The network televises collegiate sporting events each year from NCAA Division I teams, especially men's and women's basketball, but also football, soccer, field hockey, softball, baseball and lacrosse.MASN airs select home men's and women's basketball games from the University of Richmond, Virginia Commonwealth University, George Mason University and the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, as well as select Richmond home football games. The network also airs select football and basketball contests from the Division II Mountain East Conference. Other local universities that have partnered with MASN over the years include Georgetown University, Liberty University, Loyola University Maryland, George Washington University, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, and Mount St. Mary's University.
MASN served as an affiliate for the American Sports Network, a provider of syndicated sporting events primarily focused on college sports, until it became Stadium and stopped syndication in 2017. The network also aired syndicated telecasts of college football and basketball from a multitude of conferences, including the ACC, America East, American, Big 12, Big East, Big South, Big Ten, CAA, MAAC, NEC, Pac-12, Patriot League, SEC, and WAC. Many of these telecasts were produced by either ESPN Regional Television or Fox Sports Networks. Most of these conferences have since ceased broadcast distribution to regional sports networks.
Other programming
In 2010, MASN relaunched The John Riggins Show, a daily sports talk show hosted by the Washington Redskins hall of famer, who was previously with the network from 2006 to 2008. In addition to an afternoon drive program, Riggins hosted Riggo's Postgame Xtra, which aired after each Redskins game.In addition to nationally distributed college sports events, MASN carries other national programming including golf, outdoor programs, horse racing, and poker.
In 2025, MASN began airing games featuring the Minor League affiliates of the Nationals and Orioles, specificially the Norfolk Tides, Rochester Red Wings, Fredericksburg Nationals, Delmarva Shorebirds, Wilmington Blue Rocks and Aberdeen IronBirds.
Former programming
Baltimore Ravens
From 2006 to 2009, MASN served as the official regional cable broadcaster of the NFL's Baltimore Ravens, televising the team's preseason games, as well as nightly airings of team-related programming and original live post-game shows during the regular season.Other services
MASN2
The network also has a companion channel, MASN2, that airs overflow games in order to accommodate both baseball teams' schedules.High definition
MASNHD is a high definition simulcast feed of MASN, which broadcasts in the 1080i resolution format. MASN announced that it would launch a full-time HD feed on September 16, 2008, and televise 200 Major League Baseball games in HD in 2009. Since 2010, MASN and MASN2 have televised every Orioles and Nationals game not aired on national television in high definition. In 2012, all sports telecasts on the network began to be letterboxed on the network's standard definition feed via the No. 10 Active Format Description tag format, with graphics framed for 16:9 widescreen displays rather than the 4:3 safe area; games produced by MASN on WDCW and WJZ-TV utilize 4:3-optimized graphics to accommodate standard definition viewers.Controversies
Carriage controversies
Comcast
After the Orioles agreed to share their television territory with the Nationals, another controversy arose with television rights. Comcast Sports Net Mid-Atlantic, the Orioles' cable partner since 1984, dating back to its days as Home Team Sports maintained a ten-year cable television contract to broadcast Orioles games through the 2006 season. When MASN announced plans to move Orioles broadcasts to MASN, CSN Mid-Atlantic sued the Orioles seeking enforcement of a clause in its contract with the team, which Comcast SportsNet claimed allowed them the exclusive right of first and last refusal on future television contracts. MASN and the Orioles, however, claimed that MASN is a trade name for TCR Sports Broadcasting Holding, which was established in 1996 to sell all of the Orioles television rights, which resulted in the sale of the ten-year deal to HTS. Because of this, the Orioles and MASN claimed to be simply bringing their rights in-house.On July 27, 2005, after argument by Baltimore attorney Arnold M. Weiner, Montgomery County Circuit Judge Durke G. Thompson threw out Comcast's lawsuit, ruling that the clause in Comcast's contract with the Orioles had not been triggered. Comcast filed an amended complaint and on October 5, Judge Thompson threw out Comcast's second effort.
Up to that point, Comcast was the only major cable carrier that refused to carry MASN. However, as Comcast is the dominant cable provider in most of the Nationals and Orioles territory—including Baltimore and Washington themselves—this left most Nationals fans unable to see games without satellite. Additionally, Adelphia Communications – then in the middle of bankruptcy proceedings and therefore unable to reach new carriage deals – was in the process of being sold to Comcast and Time Warner Cable on a piecemeal basis. On August 4, 2006, following a settlement, it was announced that Comcast would carry MASN starting that September. Comcast was forced to drop its lawsuit under the terms of the deal. This cleared the way for the Orioles to move their games to MASN for the 2007 season.
In August 2008, MASN made a carriage complaint to the Federal Communications Commission after negotiations with Comcast did not result in a new contractual agreement. On December 23, 2009, Comcast and MASN finally settled their dispute over these systems, with the cable provider announcing plans to carry the network on systems that were not carrying it already "as early as 2010". The FCC complaint was dismissed that same day. On March 23, 2010, MASN announced that Comcast would begin carrying the network on its central Pennsylvania systems on March 31.