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ESPN has saved its 35-year relationship with MLB. But the network’s updated game schedule may come at the cost of its best baseball analyst: David Cone.
Over the past three seasons, Cone has teamed with Eduardo Pérez and Karl Ravech to give ESPN its finest Sunday Night Baseball broadcast booth in years.
But under ESPN’s new three-year, $550 million MLB deal, its game schedule will shift to midweek from Sunday nights from 2026 to 2028. That might make Cone’s ESPN schedule incompatible with his duties at the YES Network, where the five-time World Series champion calls Yankees games with Paul O’Neill.
For example, if Cone’s calling a midweek game for ESPN, he probably can’t work a midweek Yankee series on YES. It would also make travel more difficult when Cone’s calling weekend games for YES.
Cone’s current deal with ESPN is due to expire around the start of MLB’s new 2026 season, sources say. “ESPN loves Cone—and wants to keep him. But juggling the two network schedules is going to be difficult,” one source tells Front Office Sports. “We’ll see how it works out.”
On the other hand, the former Yankees star is locked in at YES for the upcoming season, according to Jared Boshnack, executive producer and VP of production. In fact, Boshnack has penciled Cone in for more than the 40-game telecasts he called last season.
“David is phenomenal. He makes our team better,” Boshnack told FOS on Wednesday. “We’re very happy to have him.”
Boshnack is not alone. A growing number of baseball insiders believe the 62-year-old Cone is the best baseball analyst on TV, ahead of Fox’s No. 1 John Smoltz. If his deal with ESPN doesn’t work out, Cone could hit the market with propitious timing.
Via its own three-year, $600 million deal with MLB, NBC Sports has picked up ESPN’s old Sunday Night Baseball TV rights. The network will be in the market for a star game analyst for its Sunday night package, as well as newly acquired properties such as the wild-card playoff round.
Don’t forget about deep-pocketed Netflix, which forged its own three-year, $150 million pact with MLB to show an Opening Night game, Home Run Derby, and the 2026 Field of Dreams games.
As evidenced by Netflix’s recent hire of Elle Duncan from ESPN, the giant streamer is finally ready to invest in long-term on-air talent rather than borrowing broadcasters from rival legacy networks. Both ESPN and Fox have had enough of that, barring their NFL talent from working Netflix’s Christmas Day doubleheader.
ESPN declined to comment on Cone, who could not be reached for comment.
