Good morning, Chicago.

The local TV broadcast landscape in Major League Baseball is a growing problem.

Beyond the looming labor strife, the regional sports network (RSN) model has been floundering for many teams. Nearly half of the teams' game broadcasts will be produced by MLB for the 2026 season after nine more came under its purview during the offseason following missed RSN payments from the previous providers.

Looking back at the Cubs' decision to launch Marquee Sports Network in 2020, Ricketts said he wouldn't do anything differently.

"Given all the market headwinds for RSNs, I think Marquee is one of the best things we ever did, " he said. "To be in control of our own destiny and be able to produce the games we want to produce the way we want to produce them, with the right people and the right staff and the right level of production quality, for us it's been a huge home run. It's been able to give us a chance to control our own destiny for a while and has been maybe the smartest thing we've done in all these years."

Ricketts acknowledged the speculation that MLB could try to put all RSNs together under league distribution, but he didn't want to delve too deeply into the topic.

"We love the network and we love our independence," Ricketts said.

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