No TV handy? Traveling and away from home? Missing your Major League Baseball fix? If you can find an internet connection, there's a solution for that. Live baseball is just a few clicks away these days, as wireless internet connections are available all over the world. Whether you're sitting around at your local coffee house, chilling in your hotel halfway around the world, or sitting on your couch while the wife is watching Dancing with the Stars, you can find the ball game on your home computer or laptop.
The first thing to ask yourself just how much coverage you want. Major League Baseball offers an official pay site that will provide you with more baseball than you can really afford to see. If you just need to catch the occasional game, because you're out of town or the relatives are visiting, you can try a third party site that's re-broadcasting your game live.
Step 1: MLB.tv The Official Site for MLB Live
The best, and legal option is to visit mlb.tv. The official site of Major League Baseball provides access to all 2,430 regular season games, live, or on demand, so you can watch at your convenience. In many cases, the games are available in HD quality, so you're getting a tremendous service. You'll also have access to integrated Yahoo Fantasy Baseball player tracking, so if you're a Fantasy Baseball fan, you'll see in real time how your team is doing.
MLB.tv is a subscription based service, and offers two levels of access. The regular service will cost you $99.95 for the year, of $19.95 on a month-to-month basis, if you're not ready to commit to the year. This gives you access to all 2,430 games, highlights, play-by-play, the fantasy player tracker, and condensed games. Pay a little more, $119.95 for the year or $24.95 monthly, and you'll get additional Premium content. This includes the choice of the home or away team broadcast, so you can listen to your favourite play-by-play guys. You'll also get standard DVR controls, so you can pause or rewind the live broadcast, and mlb.tv's Multi-Game View, which enables you to watch multiple games with picture-in-picture, a split screen, or even a quad view for those who are really hardcore.
MLB.TV Preview
Watching live baseball online can be as simple as visiting MLB.tv. Once you've subscribed, just login and you'll have live baseball at your fingertips. This video coves the 2009 MLB media player, and shows you quickly just how easy it is to use, and what you get for your subscription.
Step 2: ATDHE.net or Justin.TV
If that all seems like too much baseball (surely no one read past step one, because how can you have too much baseball?), of you're not willing to step up to the plate with the cash, there are other options. Two sites Justin. TVhttp://www.justin.tv/2 or ATDHE.nethttp://www.atdhe.net/index.html3 offer access to a number of live sports.
Justin TV is a site that allows people to re-broadcast whatever it is that they're watching. So unless you're a fan of Kansas City, there's probably someone watching who will put the effort into putting your game on live (ok, maybe even the Kansas City games too). You'll have to search for the game you want. You'll also probably get a number of links to fake streams. These are people who make it look like their broadcasting the game live, but are really trying to lure you to their pay sites. It's not recommended that you follow any of these links, you could be opening yourself up to spyware or other scams. Live game broadcast on Justin TV will not require that you leave the site, ever.
While Justin TV is a user based service, ATDHE.net hand picks the steams that it provides links to. That means that if you see the link on their list, you're much more likely to get a good and reliable feed. Most games won't have more than one or two options for the live game, so it's pretty simple to use. Just browse through their list of available games that day, and if the game has started, click on the link in their index. A new window will pop open, and voila, live Major League Baseball.
Step 3: P2P and Sopcast
If you still can't find the your baseball game live, then you should stop searching for your brother's local slow-pitch game, because it's not on ESPN. Still, there's another option that's worth looking into. It takes a little more effort, and will require some extra software, but if you're desperate, give it a try. The website is MyP2P.euhttp://www.myp2p.eu/guide.php?part=software4. The site provides detailed instructions, and a number of different things you can try, but you'll need to install at least one piece of software. Sopcast is the most common, and is easy enough to figure out. TV Ants is another possibility. But other steps may be required, depending on which stream and how many options you want to have. You can search MyP2P's list of live sports, which is extensive, and links to channels from all over the world. You may end up watching in Spanish or Chinese, but hey, it's better than no game.
