Netflix will feature Major League Baseball’s Opening Day game between the New York Yankees and San Francisco Giants next year, sources briefed on the move told The Athletic.

As part of the new three-year agreement between the MLB and the giant streamer, the Yankees’ March 25 opener at San Francisco will be Netflix’s first exclusive stream and will begin the 2026 season.

This primetime matchup is the only game that day, with the rest of the clubs opening the next day.

Netflix will also have the Home Run Derby and is expected to share a handful of special location event regular-season games with NBC/Peacock, including “Field of Dreams,” “MLB at Rickwood Field” and the “MLB Speedway” game, which debuted in August. Those games have been broadcast by Fox Sports in the past. Fox may still have unique regular-season event games.

MLB declined to comment.

These moves are all part of three-year deals that MLB is expected to announce in the coming weeks. The negotiations on these contracts took place after this past February, when ESPN opted out of the final three years of a deal in which it was set to pay $550 million on average.

MLB divided up ESPN’s old package of Sunday Night Baseball, the Home Run Derby and the playoffs to Netflix and NBC/Peacock.

To retain the around $1.65B it relinquished after the ESPN opt-out, MLB shopped an extra package, which has resulted in an agreement in place with ESPN to license its out-of-market package, MLB.TV games and five local teams in-market games to ESPN for the next three years. ESPN will also have 30 exclusive national weekday games. ESPN is expected to pay the same $1.65B in total for its next set of rights.

The exact figures for the MLB-Netflix and MLB-NBC/Peacock three-year deals are not yet known, but are expected to be in the $225 million to $250 million per season range, according to sources briefed on discussions.

NBC/Peacock will be the new home of Sunday Night Baseball and the first round of the playoffs. Peacock will replace Roku on late Sunday morning games, as the Philadelphia Inquirer previously reported. Plus, NBC/Peacock will have one or two special event games.

Netflix has a keen interest in Japan. It picked up the rights to the WBC in that market, which will take place in the spring of next year.

In MLB’s negotiations, its officials wanted to bring in more potential bidders for 2029. After the next three seasons, Fox, the longtime home of the World Series and All-Star game, and TNT Sports’ deals for playoffs will conclude, as well as the league’s international rights.

MLB commissioner Rob Manfred is hopeful to have lined up the local digital rights for all of MLB’s teams by then, but may have to make some other concessions to get big market clubs, like the Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers, on board.

For next season, the bulk of the Yankees’ games will still be on its regional sports network, YES, and around 20 local games on Amazon Prime Video. It will also have national games on Fox, ESPN, TNT Sports, Apple TV+, NBC/Peacock, and now, on Opening Day, Netflix.

(Photo: Ishika Samant / Getty Images)