If you live in the Valley, you know the drill. You sit down, crack a drink, and try to find the Suns game only to realize the channel you watched last week doesn't exist anymore. It’s a mess. Watching sports on tv in phoenix has become a part-time job involving three different streaming apps, an over-the-air antenna, and a prayer that your Wi-Fi doesn't lag during a fourth-quarter comeback.
The desert sports landscape changed forever when the regional sports network (RSN) model imploded. Bally Sports Arizona is a ghost. Now, we're in this weird, experimental era where some teams are free on local TV while others are tucked behind expensive league passes. It’s frustrating. Honestly, it’s enough to make you want to just go to a sportsbook and watch it there.
The Death of Bally and the Rise of "Free" TV
For years, if you wanted the Diamondbacks, Suns, or Coyotes (RIP), you just tuned into Bally Sports. Then the bankruptcy hit. Diamond Sports Group basically let the Phoenix market become a guinea pig for the rest of the country.
Mat Ishbia, the Suns owner, did something pretty radical. He decided to ditch cable and put games on local broadcast stations like Arizona’s Family (Channel 3 and Channel 5). This was huge. You can literally buy a $20 digital antenna from a drug store and watch Devin Booker for free. No Cox subscription. No DirecTV. Just signals out of the air. It’s a throwback to the 90s, but with better resolution.
The Arizona Diamondbacks didn't follow that exact path. Since their deal with Bally fell through mid-season a while back, MLB actually took over their broadcasts. If you want the D-backs now, you’re looking at DBACKS.TV. It’s a direct-to-consumer model. You pay a monthly fee, you stream it, and you don't deal with the cable company. It’s cleaner, sure, but it’s another $20 out of your pocket every month during the summer.
Why the Coyotes Leaving Changed Everything
We can't talk about Phoenix sports media without mentioning the hole left by the Coyotes. When they moved to Utah, a massive chunk of winter TV programming vanished. For the fans who stayed, watching hockey now means tracking the Utah Hockey Club on different platforms, but for the local casual viewer, that's one less reason to keep a sports-tier cable package. It narrowed the focus entirely onto the Suns and the rising interest in the Phoenix Rising FC or the Mercury.
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Navigating the Suns and Mercury Broadcast Loop
The Suns Live and Mercury Live apps are the new gold standard for how this works. If you’re not using an antenna, you’re using these apps. They’re built by a company called Kiswe. It’s actually pretty smart. They realized that younger fans in Scottsdale and Tempe don't have cable boxes. They have iPhones and Rokus.
But here is the catch.
Sometimes the local broadcast gets blacked out if the game is on TNT or ESPN. You’ve probably experienced that "This program is unavailable in your area" screen. It’s the worst.
To get around this, you basically need a hybrid setup. You need the local app for the 70+ "regular" games and a "skinny bundle" like YouTube TV or Fubo for the national ones. Fubo is actually one of the few that carries almost everything Phoenix sports fans need, but it’s gotten pricey. It’s pushing $80 or $90 now once you add the RSN fees. It’s almost as much as the cable bill we all tried to escape in 2018.
The Arizona Cardinals and the NFL Sunday Ticket Pivot
The Cardinals are the easiest to watch, yet the most expensive to "follow" if you're out of the house. Because the NFL is king, almost every Cards game is on Fox, CBS, or NBC. Channel 10 (KSAZ) is basically your home for the Red Sea.
However, the move of NFL Sunday Ticket to YouTube has changed the vibe. You used to have to get a satellite dish. Now, you just need a Google account. But if you’re a transplant living in Phoenix—which, let’s be real, is half the city—you’re paying $400 a year to watch your "home" team from Chicago or Philly while the Cards play on the local screen next to you.
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High Stakes and Bars
If you’re sick of the subscriptions, the Phoenix sports bar scene is actually having a renaissance because of this fragmentation. Places like Cold Beers & Cheeseburgers or Zipps are paying massive commercial licensing fees to ensure they have every single game. For many, it’s actually cheaper to buy a round of wings and a beer once a week than it is to subscribe to five different streaming services.
The Streaming Tech You Actually Need
If you're serious about sports on tv in phoenix, stop relying on your smart TV’s built-in apps. They’re slow. They crash.
- Get a dedicated device. A Roku Ultra or an Apple TV 4K handles the high-bitrate sports streams way better than a five-year-old Samsung TV.
- Hardwire your internet. If you're watching the Suns in 4K, Wi-Fi is your enemy. Run an ethernet cable to your box.
- The Antenna is non-negotiable. Even if you have cable, a Mohu Leaf antenna is a great backup for when the cable goes out during a monsoon.
The quality of the "Arizona’s Family" broadcast is surprisingly high. They use a lot of the same camera crews that worked the Bally era, so the production value hasn't dropped, even if the delivery method has.
What Most People Get Wrong About Blackouts
There’s a common myth that blackouts are the team’s fault. They aren't. They’re usually baked into contracts signed five or ten years ago. When the Suns went to local broadcast, they bypassed a lot of those old-school headaches, which is why they’re leading the league in viewership growth.
The Diamondbacks are still in a bit of a limbo. Because MLB controls the rights, they are subject to different rules than the Suns. If the D-backs are on Apple TV+ on a Friday night, you aren't finding them on your regular TV. You have to open the Apple app. It’s a fragmented mess, but it’s the price of "choice."
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The Future of the Phoenix Sports Market
Expect more consolidation. Eventually, the Suns and Diamondbacks might end up on the same "super-app" for Arizona fans. There have been talks, though nothing is official, about creating a unified "Arizona Sports" streaming hub. Until then, we’re all just toggling between inputs and hoping the login credentials still work.
The reality is that Phoenix is a top-15 media market. We have every major sport. That makes us a target for every streaming service looking to grab $10 a month. You have to be tactical.
Actionable Steps for Phoenix Viewers:
- Buy a high-quality digital antenna immediately. This secures the Suns, Mercury, and Cardinals (via local affiliates) for a one-time cost.
- Check your ISP data caps. If you switch to 100% streaming for your sports, you will blow through a 1TB data cap in a week of heavy viewing. Switch to an unlimited plan if you haven't.
- Audit your subscriptions. Cancel DBACKS.TV the second the season ends in October. There’s no reason to pay for it in December.
- Use the "Sports" tab on YouTube TV. If you use that service, customize your "Live" guide to move the local Phoenix channels to the very top so you aren't scrolling past 300 channels of junk to find the game.
- Verify local listings via the team websites. Don't trust the "Guide" on your TV; it's often wrong due to late-breaking schedule changes for national TV pickups. Check the official Suns or D-backs X (formerly Twitter) accounts an hour before tip-off.
The era of one-stop shopping is over. To stay a fan in Phoenix, you have to be a bit of a tech expert. It's annoying, but seeing the Suns in high-def without a $200 cable bill is a trade-off most are starting to accept.