Main Street Sports Group, the flailing regional sports network that emerged from bankruptcy with more financial troubles, has informed NBA and NHL teams that it will cease operations at the end of their respective seasons, freeing an additional 20 teams from their local media contracts.
Main Street runs its broadcasts under the name FanDuel Sports Network and began 2026 with 29 NBA, NHL and MLB teams in its portfolio. On the verge of spring training, though, all nine of the MLB teams shed their local media contracts with them. Thirteen NBA teams will follow when their regular seasons conclude on April 12. Seven NHL teams will officially do the same at the conclusion of the first round of the playoffs later that month.
In a statement to ESPN on Friday, a spokesperson for Main Street Sports wrote: "FanDuel Sports Network has reached agreements with the NBA and NHL to broadcast games and other programming through the end of the 2026 NBA regular season and the end of the first round of the NHL playoffs. We are preparing to wind down our operations upon seasons' end unless we reach a strategic transaction. We're pleased to finish out the NBA and NHL seasons, and we appreciate the collaborative relationships we have enjoyed with our team and league partners as well as the connections we have fostered with local fans."
Main Street was once Diamond Sports Group, a subsidiary of Sinclair Broadcast Group that took on nearly $9 billion of debt to purchase 21 regional channels from Fox, pushing it into bankruptcy in March 2023. Twenty-two months later -- after several missed payments, continual angst, bitter court battles and a three-month period in which Comcast pulled its channels off the air -- the company emerged from bankruptcy.
By Jan. 2, 2025, the company had secured a new naming rights deal, retained a robust portfolio across three leagues and signed a commercial agreement with Amazon. There was hope for sustained operations -- but those did not last even a whole year. Sports Business Journal reported in late December that Main Street Sports had missed a payment to MLB's St. Louis Cardinals and that it was pitching a last-ditch sale to streaming and entertainment platform DAZN to save its business.
That deal with DAZN eventually disintegrated. More missed payments followed, prompting all MLB teams to shed their previous deals. Another investor seemingly has not emerged. And soon, barring a last-minute miracle investor, the company will likely cease operation.
NBA and NHL teams have not been paid their rights fees this year, according to Sports Business Journal, which first reported that Main Street would begin its wind-down process. Those teams are expected to be reimbursed for some of their lost payments, SBJ added.