TV Answer Man, I thought DIRECTV was going to have the Red Sox games in 4K. But they had a Red Sox home game yesterday and no 4K! What happened? Why didn’t they show the game in 4K? — Paul, Westborough, Massachusetts.
Paul, you’re right. NESN’s long anticipated 4K broadcasts of Boston Red Sox home games began yesterday with the team’s 2022 home opener against the Minnesota Twins.
The regional sports channel has been promising 4K coverage of the Sox at home (and Bruins) for more than a year after unveiling a new 4K-enabled studio. However, until now, no pay TV provider would step up to the plate to show the games in 4K. Verizon yesterday was the first TV service to show a Red Sox game in 4K. (The 4K games are only available on Verizon in 4K in the Boston market.)
But what about DIRECTV? Isn’t the company that says it’s the leader in 4K sports going to offer NESN in 4K, too?
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Well, earlier this week, DIRECTV added Friday’s NESN 4K broadcast to its on-screen guide. However, it removed the listing early Friday without explanation. We asked DIRECTV (several times) if it would offer NESN in 4K, but the satcaster would not confirm that. (NESN’s public relations team has also not returned our calls.)
Making matters more confusing, DIRECTV’s on-screen guide yesterday had today’s Red Sox-Twins NESN 4K broadcast listed, but it has removed that as well.
Without further clarification from DIRECTV, I can only surmise that the satcaster has been unable to reach a deal with NESN for the 4K games or it’s having technical issues in providing them.
The TV Answer Man will monitor this situation and report back here if anything significant changes.
Also noteworthy: FuboTV, the live streaming service that carries NESN and offers 4K programming, tells the TV Answer Man that it has no plans for a NESN 4K announcement at this time. And Comcast told us a few weeks ago that it was not planning to provide NESN in 4K.
Paul, hope that helps. Happy viewing and stay safe!
Have a question about new TV technologies? Send it to The TV Answer Man at swann@tvanswerman.com Please include your first name and hometown in your message.
— Phillip Swann
@tvanswerman
Something fishy with Verizon 4K yesterday they showed the game in 4K and it was beautiful and today they have the game there but the picture is not 4K then I check Nesn regular HD Channel wasn’t there they only had Nesn +
I really wish the MLB would stream these 4K games on the MLB.TV app.
They barely have the bandwidth for 1080p. They used to have excellent picture quality but the resolution lately has been weak.
I don’t know know how much th speed has to do with it for DirecTV’s streaming app the best it gets is HD 1080p most live programs are in 720p. YouTube TV seems to have a lil more especially sports that are in 4k