
Live From MLB All-Star 2025: MLB Network Marks Five Straight Years of Onsite MLB Draft Coverage The Battery Atlanta's Coca-Cola Roxy will house Rounds 1-3 of this year's Draft By Kristian Hern ndez, Senior Editor
Sunday, July 13, 2025 - 11:56 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
Atlanta and professional baseball have longstanding ties, and, for the first time since the turn of the millennium, MLB All-Star returns to the city, ready to write another chapter. Many aspects of the tentpole event have changed over the past quarter century, addition of the MLB Draft being the most notable. As the Draft has grown into a must-watch spectacle, so has MLB Network's operation in its fifth consecutive year of covering it.
[MLB All-Star] has grown a lot since 2000, says Marc Caiafa, SVP production, MLB Network. Everything from our operations to our programming has gotten bigger and better.
The Coca-Cola Roxy is hosting Day 1 of the 2025 MLB Draft in Atlanta.
In A-Town: Game Creek Video Varsity Houses Operations Team The two-day Draft festivities will take place on Sunday, July 13 and Monday, July 14, but, before they begin, the team has seen a handful of upsides in the Atlanta locale. Truist Park, home of the 2021 World Series champion Atlanta Braves, is still one of the league's youngest venues, having opened in 2017. Surrounding the venue is The Battery Atlanta: a bustling neighborhood filled with restaurants, bars, entertainment venues, and more that has become a hotbed of energy and fun for fans before and after games. The only possible downside is that, without much empty space around the stadium, the broadcast compound at Truist Park can become a bit congested.
It's definitely a challenge with so many broadcasters in so many locations, says Samantha Calastro, senior international operations manager, MLB Network. We keep getting more and more things added, but [VP, Live Events] Chris [Pfeiffer] is making sure we're organized on the production side while [VP, Remote Operations] Tommy [Guidice], [Director, Remote Technical Operations] Zaac [Christopher], and [Technical Manager] Kelly [Karsch-Bournes] make sure that we're in a great place technically.
Previous MLB Drafts have taken place at a considerable distance from the stadium. For instance, 2022's edition in Los Angeles was held at L.A. Live, 3 miles from Dodger Stadium. Or last year's effort in Arlington, TX, when MLB Network set up shop at historic Fort Worth Stockyards' Cowtown Coliseum, 20 miles from Globe Life Field. Luckily, the site of the 2025 MLB Draft - the 3,600 seat Coca-Cola Roxy - is in the footprint of The Battery Atlanta and adjacent to the ballpark's home-plate gate. Parked at the stadium, Game Creek Video Varsity A and B will be able to cover not only the two-day Draft but also events taking place on the field.
A View From Above: DEFY WireCam Offers New Vantage Point As the MLB Draft becomes more of a priority, MLB Network is matching the event's importance with high-quality cameras. A brand-new addition to an already stacked lineup of tech toys is the DEFY WireCam. Making a sizeable difference in permanent installations at many stadiums, as well as adding unique angles on plays to broadcasts produced by MLB Local Media, the aerial camera is a welcome sight in Atlanta for Day 1's schedule at the Coca-Cola Roxy.
This will be used by Van Wagner for the in-venue experience, notes Christopher, but we'll be able to take a feed of it [for the broadcast]. It's going to be great to be able to show off the intimacy of this theater.
In addition, MLB Network will deploy two roaming Sony HDC-2500 RF handheld cameras and integrate various feeds from fellow broadcaster ESPN and Van Wagner. Among the feeds are a hard camera of the podium, an RF handheld for interviews, a roaming RF handheld, and a roaming RF Steadicam from ESPN; plus a Sony HDC-2500 hard camera for another podium shot, a Sony HDC-2500 hard camera at the slash position, a Sony HDC-2500 RF handheld, and a Sony HDC-P1 RF Steadicam from Van Wagner. Two main sets will be captured with three Sony HDC-2500 hard cameras each, and the third set, for analyst Melanie Newman, will use two robotic cameras from NEP Specialty Capture (formerly Fletcher).
Behind the scenes, BitFire Networks will once again be a critical partner, providing video feeds of various prospects participating remotely. Three BitFire servers will connect the concert venue with these Draft picks and with each MLB club's Draft room, highlighting club executives before and after their respective selections.
Greg Amsinger, Tony Vitello, and Dan O'Dowd on MLB Network's main set.
A Plus in Production: FanDuel Sports Network Set Provides Secondary Site for Talent From a production perspective, curating an engaging broadcast for the MLB Draft is a delicate dance with many simultaneous elements to show. At the front bench, the crew has a lot on their plate: it relies on the on-air talent to fill in time between picks, communicates with the team at MLB Global Events to be ready when the pick is about to be announced, spotlights the atmosphere inside the venue, gives adequate time to analyze the pick, and stitches together moments for storytelling that will get fans excited over the future stars. Coordinating Producer Chris Roenbeck, handling his third MLB Draft, will be tasked with combining all these ingredients into a tantalizing feast for the eyes.
We've assigned each of our talent certain prospects to focus on, he explains. We've been going over the different graphics and video breakdowns for their set of prospects. The week before is about buttoning up all of their requests and making sure they feel supported by all the information that our research team can provide.
As with MLB Drafts in the
North America Stories
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
28/08/2025
IBC stand 5.F81
Wowza to Reveal Next-Gen Video Streaming Innovations at IBC 2025
Amsterdam, August 28, 2025 Wowza, a leader in video streaming infrastructur...
28/08/2025
VIDA, the secure cloud-native media asset management platform, is launching at IBC Show 2025 Media Factory, a drag-and-drop workflow automation engine designed ...
28/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has admitted that it inadvertently removed some rules relating to NextGen TV/ATSC 3.0 and has moved to correct ...
28/08/2025
WASHINGTON The National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) has announced the launch of the NextGen TV News Technology Lab, a three-year initiative designed to he...
28/08/2025
BRASILIA Brazilian President Luiz In cio Lula da Silva has signed an official presidential decree establishing DTV+ (TV 3.0) incorporating many parts of the ATS...
28/08/2025
With the FCC's spectrum auction authority back in hand, lines in the sand are being drawn for the potential reallocation of the Upper C-Band for 5G mobile b...
28/08/2025
As the use of generative AI becomes more common in media operations and production, Netflix has laid out detailed guidelines for their use and provided guidance...
28/08/2025
Fox and YouTube TV have agreed to a short-term extension in their carriage talks as they try to replace the existing agreement that expired on August 27 at 5 pm...
28/08/2025
Boston Conservatory at Berklee Announces Center Stage Performances for 2025-2026...
28/08/2025
The new oil is sports': Saudis share masterplan to boost esports on global stage By Adrian Pennington
Tuesday, August 26, 2025 - 08:49
Print This Story...
28/08/2025
Esports World Cup 2025: Team Falcons Defend Title as Broadcast Production Ramps ...
28/08/2025
Report: Mobile-first content has overtaken the big screen as the way fans watch ...
28/08/2025
New Era: A Pro's Guide to ESPN's Expanded College Football Playoff Graph...
28/08/2025
College Football Kickoff 2025: The CW Heads Into ACC, Pac-12 Schedule With New P...