The Brewers, one of 14 MLB clubs to have their local games produced and distributed by the league-run model, have now put a specific figure on the economic loss from that pivot.
During a press conference ahead of Milwaukee’s season opener on Thursday, team owner Mark Attanasio said the move from the embattled Main Street Sports Group—parent company of the FanDuel Sports Network—to the MLB Media model resulted in a $20 million hit.
“It probably shouldn’t have been a surprise, but it was late-breaking news,” Attanasio said of last month’s move away from Main Street Sports. “So we budgeted otherwise, but we were already in the process of doing things. We have a lot of flexibility in our balance sheet. We manage the club that way. Sometimes your greatest strength is your biggest weakness. Everybody is ‘payroll, payroll, payroll,’ but we have a very strong financial position. And so when surprises come up like that—and that was about a $20 million surprise—it does not affect how we plan for the offseason.”
It has long been believed that many of the MLB clubs now without a traditional regional sports network have suffered eight-figure revenue hits. Attanasio, however, is the first team owner to publicly detail the loss.
The $20 million impact for the Brewers is a combination of lost revenue and increased production expenses. Compared to the guaranteed rights fees that a traditional RSN such as FanDuel Sports Network provided, the MLB Media model is essentially an eat-what-you-kill scenario in which revenue is dependent on the advertising and carriage fees that are generated.
“It’s a pretty big one-off. We don’t like $20 million negative surprises,” Attanasio said. “[But] the strength of our fan base, our sponsorship group that comes to support us, makes a big difference.”
Outperforming the Field
To Attanasio’s point, the Brewers continue to push beyond what the Milwaukee media market— the smallest in MLB until Las Vegas arrives in 2028—would suggest.
The Brewers’ 2026 luxury-tax payroll of $132.2 million ranks 22nd in the league. Many of the franchise’s other key indicators, meanwhile, are far stronger, including local TV ratings that were the second highest in MLB last year. The club’s 2025 total attendance of 2.65 million was a post-pandemic high at American Family Field and ranked 12th in the league.
After reaching last year’s National League Championship Series with a club built primarily through the draft and trades, the Brewers started their new season on Thursday with a dominant 14–2 win over the White Sox.
“There’s definitely a correlation between money and success,” Attanasio said. “That said, I think we were 23rd in payroll last year, and we had the most [regular-season] wins. What we’ve done every year is look at our roster and how things fit. With the youth of the team and where everybody is in the arc of their career, there really weren’t a lot of spots to fill.”
