MLB on Five

MLB on Five
Presented by	Jonny Gould Josh Chetwynd
Country of origin	United Kingdom
No. of episodes	500+
Production
Producer(s)	Sunset + Vine
Running time	3:00 - 6:00 (per episode)
Release
Original network	Channel 5
Original release	Mar 1997 – Dec 2008

MLB on Five is a sports television programme on Channel 5 in the UK providing live coverage of Major League Baseball games. It was usually broadcast on Sunday (going into Monday morning) and Wednesday nights (going into Thursday). The Sunday broadcasts usually began at around 1am BST leading into the live Sunday Night Baseball telecast, while the Wednesday programme began at various times and the game was usually shown with a one- to two-hour delay. Five also provided live coverage of the All-Star Game and World Series.

Regular-season game commentary was taken direct from ESPN; All-Star Game and World Series broadcasts typically used the MLB International feed.

The show was first broadcast on Opening Day in 1997 with a game between the defending World Series champion New York Yankees and the Seattle Mariners. Ir was initially part of the channel's "Live & Dangerous" late night sport strand; however, by the 1998 season it had been separated and renamed MLB on Five. For its first eighteen months, the show was sponsored by Coors Extra Gold, complete with break bumpers with the voice-over "Major League Baseball: a taste of real America in association with Coors Extra Gold". By June in the 1998 season, this sponsorship deal had ended, and the show has not had a sponsor since.

The original hosts of the show were Tommy Boyd and Todd Macklin. Macklin had originally been hired as a producer for the show and was only put into the analyst role when no one else could be found. "Did Elvis like baseball?" enquired Boyd in one exchange. "Could he eat it?" replied Macklin.

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