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The 2025 Major League Baseball season is scheduled to begin on March 18–19 with a two-game series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Chicago Cubs held in Tokyo, Japan, before the regular season proper runs from March 27 to September 28. The 95th All-Star Game is planned for July 15 at Truist Park in Cumberland, Georgia, the home of the Atlanta Braves. Going into the season, the defending World Series champions are the Los Angeles Dodgers from the 2024 season.

The Athletics plan to temporarily relocate from Oakland to West Sacramento, California, for at least three seasons before permanently moving to Las Vegas. The team will be branded as the Athletics, with no city name attached.

Schedule

Major League Baseball released its 2025 schedule on July 18, 2024. There are 162 games scheduled for all teams. The scheduling formula was modified this season to increase the number of games between "prime" Interleague rivals from four to six, playing two three-game series instead of two two-game series. May 16–18 has also been designated as "Rivalry Weekend", featuring 11 series of these "prime" Interleague rivals.

The Los Angeles Dodgers and the Chicago Cubs are scheduled to open the season at the Tokyo Dome in Tokyo on March 18–19. Opening Day on the U.S. mainland is then planned for March 27 except for the Colorado Rockies and the Tampa Bay Rays, which was rescheduled to March 28 due to works at the Rays' temporary ground Steinbrenner Field.

The 95th All-Star Game will be played on July 15, hosted by the Atlanta Braves at Truist Park in Cumberland, Georgia. The Atlanta Braves and Cincinnati Reds will play a game at Bristol Motor Speedway in Bristol, Tennessee on August 2. The MLB Little League Classic at Bowman Field in Williamsport, Pennsylvania will be played on August 17 with the Seattle Mariners taking on the New York Mets.

Managerial changes

General managers

Off-season

Field managers

Off-season

Venues

On November 16, 2023, MLB owners approved the Athletics' relocation from Oakland to Las Vegas. The Athletics then announced on April 4, 2024, that the team would temporarily play at Sutter Health Park in West Sacramento, California, from 2025 to 2027, with an option for 2028, while their new ballpark in Las Vegas is under construction.

Owing to severe roof damage sustained at Tropicana Field caused by Hurricane Milton, the Tampa Bay Rays will play at George M. Steinbrenner Field, the New York Yankees' spring training stadium in Tampa.

Guaranteed Rate Field, home of the Chicago White Sox, was renamed to Rate Field during the offseason on December 17, 2024 as part of a rebrand of Guaranteed Rate.

Minute Maid Park, home of the Houston Astros, was renamed to Daikin Park during the offseason on January 1, 2025 after Japanese air conditioning manufacturer Daikin bought the naming rights.

Uniforms

Wholesale changes

• The Guardians unveiled a new uniform set. The biggest change for the 2025 season will be seen in Cleveland’s blue alternative uniform set. The jersey will continue to have a navy base but will move away from "Cleveland" across the chest and instead feature the Guardians "Diamond C" logo. The Guardians red home alternative uniform will feature a new look across the chest, as the script Guardians from 2024 will change to the club’s Bridge Print font with "Guardians" across the chest. Piping on the red jersey will showcase a blue-white-blue look. Cleveland’s white home uniform will continue to carry on its primary historic look with the script "Guardians" across the chest. The logo will shift from being on a slant to horizontal. New piping will be on the jersey with a red-blue-red design on the neckline and arms. A new home hat will make its debut in 2025, solely with the white uniform set, as the main color of the hat will change to red with a blue bill. All hats will continue to feature the "Diamond C," and the club’s blue cap with red bill will be worn with all other jerseys (home red, road blue, road gray). The road uniform will stay the same.

Anniversaries and special events

Media

Television

National

This will be the fourth year of the existing seven-year deals with ESPN, Fox, TBS, Apple TV+, and MLB Network.

Linear television

• Fox will continue to air their Fox Saturday Baseball and Baseball Night in America slate of exclusive weekend games. The network will also air the 2025 MLB All-Star Game. FS1 will also broadcast non-exclusive games.
• TBS will continue to broadcast Tuesday Night Baseball. Most games are blacked out in the home markets of the teams playing, however, TBS is allowed to co-exist once with a team's local broadcast.
• ESPN will continue to broadcast Sunday Night Baseball, with the option to show alternate broadcasts, along with at-least five other exclusive regular season games. For the first time since 2021, ESPN will air a doubleheader on Opening Day. The network also has the rights to the Home Run Derby. Select games may air on ABC and ESPN2.
• MLB Network will continue to broadcast games daily. While most games will be simulcasts of the home teams' regional sports network broadcasts, select games will be produced by the network under its MLB Network Showcase banner. All games are blacked out in the home markets of the teams playing.

Streaming

• ESPN+ continues to hold the rights to stream selected games. These games will be blacked out in local markets.
• Max will continue to simulcast TBS' games on its Bleacher Report Sports Add-on tier.
• Apple TV+ continues to hold the rights to Friday Night Baseball.
• This will be the second season that MLB Sunday Leadoff will be streamed on The Roku Channel under a multi-year deal.
• The league's MLB.tv will continue to stream out-of-market games, and all of Roku's games.

Postseason

During the postseason, the ESPN networks (including ABC, with Spanish–language simulcasts on ESPN Deportes) will air all four Wild Card Series. TNT Sports (TNT, TBS and TruTv, with Spanish-language simulcasts on Univision Deportes) will then broadcast the National League Division Series and the National League Championship Series, and Fox Sports (Fox and FS1, with Spanish-language simulcasts on Fox Deportes) will broadcast the American League Division Series, the American League Championship Series and the World Series.

Local

• The Chicago White Sox, the NBA's Chicago Bulls, the NHL's Chicago Blackhawks, and Standard Media launched the Chicago Sports Network in October 2024, replacing NBC Sports Chicago as their regional broadcaster.
• On November 22, 2024, the Miami Marlins parted ways with television play-by-play announcer Paul Severino after seven seasons.

Diamond Sports bankruptcy

This will be the third season affected by the February 2023 bankruptcy of Diamond Sports Group, owners of the Bally Sports regional sports networks.

The Cleveland Guardians, Milwaukee Brewers, Minnesota Twins, and Texas Rangers' contracts with Bally Sports Great Lakes, Bally Sports Wisconsin, Bally Sports North, and Bally Sports Southwest, respectively, expired at the end of their 2024 regular seasons. The Rangers were reported to be developing a "direct-to-distributor" model, which would involve an ad-hoc network for game broadcasts distributed directly to television providers (similar to MLB Local Media, except operated in-house by the team), and a streaming platform that would carry the games and ancillary content. On October 8, 2024, MLB Local Media announced that it would assume the rights to the Brewers, Guardians, and Twins beginning in the 2025 season.

On October 2, 2024, Diamond Sports announced its intention to renegotiate its contracts with eight MLB teams. The teams include the Cincinnati Reds, Detroit Tigers, Kansas City Royals, Los Angeles Angels, Miami Marlins, St. Louis Cardinals, and Tampa Bay Rays. If teams are unable to agree to a new contract with Diamond, their contract will be rejected. The Atlanta Braves were the only team not being affected by this announcement. Diamond Sports announced new agreements with Marlins, on October 18, and the Cardinals, on November 7 (which also added over-the-top streaming rights for its direct-to-consumer streaming service). On November 8, the Reds and Diamond announced a settlement which will officially end their contract.

In October 2024, Diamond announced a new sponsorship agreement with FanDuel, which re-branded Bally Sports as FanDuel Sports Network on October 21. The naming rights will be paid for via an annual rights fee and advertising commitments. FanDuel will also have the option to acquire a 5% equity stake in Diamond once it exits Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

On November 8, 2024, Major League Baseball and the Atlanta Braves officially objected to Diamond Sports' reorganization plan from bankruptcy, saying they had "grave concerns" about the companies' future viability. However, on November 13, Major League Baseball and the Braves dropped their objection, after Diamond Sports reached amended agreements with the Braves, Los Angeles Angels, Tampa Bay Rays, and Detroit Tigers. Diamond Sports will acquire local direct-to-consumer streaming rights for all the teams it renegotiated with. That same day, MLB Local Media announced it would assume the television rights to the Cincinnati Reds. Diamond Sports announced an amended contract with the Kansas City Royals on December 3.

On December 18, the Braves announced that it would sublicense a package of 15 regular season games to Gray Television. The games will be carried by a network of Gray-owned broadcast television stations within the Braves' market in simulcast with FanDuel Sports Network South, with WPCH-TV in Atlanta as flagship station. In addition, Gray will also exclusively produce and air 10 spring training games. The deal resembles arrangements made under Diamond's NBA contracts, which similarly enable teams to sublicense a limited package of games for broadcast television.

Teams changing television homes

Mostly due to the bankruptcy of Diamond Sports Group, a significant number of teams changed their local broadcast television outlet for the 2025 season:

Radio

Local

• On November 14, 2024, the New York Yankees announced the hiring of Dave Sims as the team's primary radio play-by-play announcer, succeeding John Sterling. Sims was previously the lead television play-by-play announcer of the Seattle Mariners, holding the job since 2007.
• On November 15, 2024, the Los Angeles Dodgers announced the hiring of Luis Cruz (who played for the team in 2012 and 2013) as an analyst for its Spanish-language radio broadcasts, succeeding Fernando Valenzuela—who had died on October 22, 2024.

Retired numbers

• David Wright will have his No. 5 retired by the New York Mets on July 19. This will be the eleventh number retired by the team.

Notes

References

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External links

• 2025 Major League Baseball Schedule

• 2025 Major League Baseball season
• Major League Baseball seasons
• 2025 in baseball