A new yes network promotional push is leaning into a familiar complaint: even dedicated fans can struggle to figure out where to watch Major League Baseball games as broadcasts spread across more platforms.
Why did Yes Network recruit Larry David to make the point?
YES Network released a new commercial on Friday featuring Larry David, the “Seinfeld” co-creator and “Curb Your Enthusiasm” star, built around the rising difficulty many fans feel when trying to locate MLB games on television. In the spot, David plays an exasperated fan who cannot find the Yankees game and turns to longtime play-by-play announcer Michael Kay for help.
In the ad, David calls Kay and asks how to get the game. Kay’s solution is simple: he tells David to speak the instruction into the remote—“watch the Yankees on YES Network. ” The concept is intentionally direct, presenting a one-step fix to a problem the campaign frames as increasingly common.
The campaign also exists in multiple cuts. The advertisements come in 30- and 60-second versions, and they debuted on Friday ahead of the channel’s first broadcast of the Yankees’ 2026 season. The overall message is less about comedy for its own sake and more about reassuring viewers that locating Yankees broadcasts does not have to be complicated.
What problem is the campaign responding to in the Yankees broadcast ecosystem?
The commercials arrive at a moment when more MLB games are broadcast on streaming platforms, a shift that has pulled some games away from traditional local outlets such as YES Network. The result, as the campaign portrays it, is a fragmented viewing experience in which fans may need to spend more money on streaming services and may feel uncertain about where to watch from game to game.
Michael Kay described the personal and professional tension created by that fragmentation, highlighting how major games can land outside the channel’s control. He said it is “frustrating” not to do a big game like Opening Day, adding that it was the second year in a row he had not called it and that YES would not be able to do it until Friday. Kay also said he understands the economic logic behind selling games into streaming packages, while noting that national windows will take games that are permitted to be taken.
One example cited in the surrounding discussion of the shifting landscape: the Yankees’ Opening Day win over the Giants was broadcast on Netflix. That kind of distribution change is at the center of what the new YES Network campaign is trying to address—without arguing the business case, but by focusing on the fan’s practical question: where do I find tonight’s game?
How did the Larry David–Michael Kay pairing come together, and what does YES want from it?
The collaboration is rooted in an existing relationship. Kay’s connection with David goes back years, including when Kay hosted David on YES Network’s “CenterStage. ” The two bonded over their shared New York heritage and kept in touch, at times texting about Yankees games—messages that, Kay said, can even arrive while he is on the air.
Both Kay and YES executives presented David as more than a celebrity cameo. Kay said David is a serious sports fan who “really knows what’s going on, ” describing the commercial as something that could have been an episode of “Curb, ” shaped around David’s on-brand impatience with friction and confusion. Kay characterized David as similar to his “Curb” persona in temperament, though “just not mean, ” and said the role fit naturally.
Bill Bergofin, the network’s head of marketing & creative, said the goal is straightforward: “we want people to watch as much Yankees baseball as they possibly can on YES. ” Bergofin also said the concept came together only a few weeks ago, and that it largely happened because Kay could make the introduction to David. Kay said he was initially reluctant to ask, not wanting to “infringe upon a friendship, ” but David agreed immediately.
YES Network is also using the campaign to elevate its offering as it enters its 25th season broadcasting Yankees baseball. The promotional spot ends by directing viewers to a webpage on YES Network’s site that includes a broadcast schedule, laying out where to watch the Yankees even if a particular game is not on the channel or the Gotham Sports app. The mechanics of that schedule are part of the campaign’s implicit argument: the game may move, but the viewer can still find it.
Kay also addressed the uncertain upside of celebrity-driven promotions. He said he has seen an uptick in interest when celebrities appear on his radio show, but described television impact as harder to quantify because “Yankee fans are going to be Yankee fans. ” Still, he framed the ad as an enhancement to the viewing experience, with the potential—if it spreads widely on social media—to become something bigger. Separately, Kay said David, who resides in Los Angeles and visits New York frequently, has an open invitation to join him in the booth on Yankees broadcasts.
For now, the campaign’s bet is simple: meet fans where the frustration is, make the instruction memorable, and attach it to familiar voices. Whether that is enough to cut through a complex distribution environment is still an open question, but the immediate message from yes network is that finding Yankees baseball should feel easy again.
