The Battery Just Showed Why the Braves Built It

Mixed-use profits nearly erased the baseball operation’s first-half losses, giving Atlanta room to absorb higher payroll and BravesVision’s growing pains.

For the first six months of 2026, the Atlanta Braves’ baseball operation produced negative $38.1 million in Adjusted OIBDA - Operating Income Before Depreciation and Amortization charges are applied - a measure of the profitability of the core business activities.

During the same period, The Battery Atlanta, Pennant Park and the rest of Atlanta Braves Holdings’ mixed-use portfolio generated positive $38.2 million.

The difference was just $174,000.

That may be the clearest explanation yet for why the Braves spent years building a business around their baseball team. While the baseball operation absorbed higher player salaries, BravesVision startup and operating expenses, and the costs associated with special events, mixed-use development provided an almost perfectly equal operating cushion.

BravesVision still has to prove it can reproduce the economics of Atlanta’s old television agreement. The Battery is giving it time to find out.

Let’s talk about it.

The Most Important Numbers Weren’t Revenue

As always, the first step towards looking at the financials for Atlanta Braves Holdings is establishing how many home games were in each quarter.

Bad news there.

Because Atlanta opened at home this year (seemingly for the first time in forever), 2026’s 2nd quarter lost some games to March and had just 34 home games. Last year, the same quarter had 40, because Atlanta was returning home from that disastrous 0-7 road trip in San Diego and Los Angeles.

But despite having 15% fewer games, total revenue declined just 2%, from $312.4 million to $305.1 million.

Now, to be clear, that’s total revenue, i.e., everything. Despite 15% fewer games, baseball event revenue declined just 11%, representing an improvement of roughly 5% per game in revenue.

Comparing the first halves versus just the second quarters is cleaner, as it’s a 39-home-game versus 40-home-game comparison. Baseball event revenue increased about 2%, and total revenue increased 5%, to $377.1M.

ABH management credited higher average attendance, contractual season ticket increases, and favorable single-game sales for the growth in baseball event revenue. The growth in total revenue had some other factors that folded in there - Retail and licensing revenue being up 18% because of demand for this year’s refreshed City Connect apparel, other baseball revenue being up $13.4 million because of three Savannah Bananas games and an additional concert in the ballpark, and mixed-use revenue up 14%.

Essentially, by growing the business, ABH successfully replaced much of the revenue removed by the schedule. The cost of producing that revenue created a much different result farther down the income statement, though.

Why the Baseball Business Went Negative

The second quarter’s baseball operating costs were up about $41.2M, roughly 20%. As a result, baseball adjusted OIBDA went from a positive $52.0M to a negative $5.7M. Companywide Adjusted OIBDA declined 82%, from $65.7 million to $11.8 million. Operating income separately swung from a positive $41.8 million to an $18.5 million loss.

There’s an explanation here too - higher player salaries, special event expenses, MLB revenue sharing, but those are things the organization is always dealing with.

Several of those categories are familiar expenses for a baseball team, although their size changes from year to year. BravesVision added an entirely new recurring layer.

ABH now carries the economics associated with producing, distributing, selling and marketing its local broadcasts. The organization uses partners such as Gray Media and Raycom Sports, but those costs now sit inside Atlanta Braves Holdings rather than with a third-party rights holder.

Now, a quick caveat: ABH did not disclose how much of the increase in costs came from each category, and the entire decline cannot be attributed to BravesVision.

But CFO Jill Robinson explained on the call that BravesVision expenses are ongoing costs, with elevated spending during the season and some costs continuing through the offseason.

The baseball segment could not absorb all of those costs by itself. The rest of Atlanta Braves Holdings nearly did.

The Battery Did What It Was Built to Do

Mixed-use development revenue for the first half of the year increased 26% to $54.9M, with the corresponding Adjusted OIBDA coming in at $38.237M.

And when you dive into the operational indicators, the fundamentals of the sector remain strong. The portfolio’s occupancy is above 93%, with 64,000 square feet currently under redevelopment and Pennant Park contributing for a full comparable year. There were record monthly tenant sales during the quarter, with replacement-tenant sales up 130%.

And most importantly, approximately 4.7 million visitors to The Battery Atlanta during the first half, up 6.5%. ABH officials attributed this, in part, to World Cup watch parties and other programming scheduled for non-baseball event days.

The end result of increased mixed-use development business is almost a perfect offset to the baseball segment’s negative Adjusted OIBDA.

• Baseball Adjusted OIBDA: negative $38.063 million

• Mixed-use Adjusted OIBDA: positive $38.237 million

That’s a difference of just $174,000.

Now, there are (as always) some caveats here, including the fact that baseball revenue is highly seasonal and that corporate and other costs came in at close to $6M, meaning the overall first-half Adjusted OIBDA was still negative.

Additionally, it’s important to remember that mixed-use revenue (which is derived from a portfolio that carries roughly $486M in debt) is much smaller than baseball revenue.

Still, The Battery operated exactly as intended: as a stabilizer and profitable cash-flow engine, although certainly not an unlimited payroll account. Its contribution did not eliminate the cost of BravesVision. It gave Atlanta more room to carry the transition.

What That Cushion Buys Atlanta

Something that ABH officials identified in the increased baseball costs, in addition to BravesVision, was higher major-league salaries.

Which tells us this: Atlanta did not fund BravesVision by forcing the baseball operation to reduce player spending.

Now, I’m not saying The Battery dollars were transferred directly into payroll or anything, but when you zoom out, the existence of revenue-generating mixed-use development allowed ABH to realize a few benefits:

• Atlanta could carry higher player costs.

• Atlanta could absorb BravesVision’s recurring expenses.

• Atlanta could handle a temporary mismatch between media expenses and collections.

• Atlanta could continue investing in special events and mixed-use development.

There was a meaningful cash-flow impact. Operating cash flow for the first six months was negative $1.6 million, compared with positive $87.6 million last year. During Q2, gross debt increased $83.7 million as ABH drew on baseball-related credit facilities to support working capital.

That does not indicate an immediate liquidity problem. The organization remains in compliance with its debt covenants and reported approximately $205 million in additional borrowing capacity. It does demonstrate the value of having profitable operations outside the baseball segment while the new media model matures.

The Battery can provide the runway. BravesVision must still demonstrate that the destination is worth reaching.

BravesVision Still Has to Pass the Harder Test

Something that ABH did on their financials is rename a line item to “media-related revenue” - since they’re now in the direct-to-consumer business, it’s technically not broadcast anymore, so the name change makes sense.

That revenue declined 10% in Q2 and 12% for the first half of the year. Now, that category contains more than just BravesVision, including local distribution, national media, radio, and other smaller media items, and ABH didn’t break out specifics inside the category,

ABH primarily attributed the decline to the timing of revenue recognition under BravesVision’s linear distribution agreements, along with changes in certain national media arrangements. In simpler terms, the new revenue does not arrive or get recognized on the same schedule as the old rights fee.

Under the old model, ABH got a rights fee check from their previous broadcaster, who carried the production, distribution, and advertising expenses but also kept everything they earned outside that rights fee.

ABH now controls more revenue sources…but also carries recurring operating costs. They’re on the hook for the production, distribution, and advertising costs.

And despite BravesVision not having a complete year of linear distribution revenue in 2026; the entity essentially started April 1st. ABH primarily attributed the decline to the timing of revenue recognition under BravesVision’s linear distribution agreements, along with changes in certain national media arrangements. In simpler terms, the new revenue does not arrive or get recognized on the same schedule as the old rights fee.

But they said ‘revenue'‘, not ‘profit’.

If BravesVision eventually produces the same revenue as the old rights fee while leaving ABH responsible for substantial recurring operating costs, the new model would be less profitable than the agreement it replaced.

And unfortunately, we’re not going to know just yet if BravesVision will get there; we’re missing too much information. Here’s what we would need to figure out a more complete picture:

• BravesVision subscriber count

• Subscriber churn

• Average revenue per subscriber

• Standalone operating expenses

• Contribution margin

• Direct comparison with the previous rights agreement

And we don’t have any of that yet.

The Test From Here

The future of BravesVision is still up in the air - think of it as an investment that hasn’t cashed in yet. After a complete annual cycle of media-related revenue and some natural normalization of advertising and distribution collections, we can sit back and assess whether or not BravesVision is generating more usable cash after expenses and, eventually, whether that additional media cash supports sustained major-league payroll.

But what we do know now is that ABH has the tools to protect revenue when the home schedule works against it, by allowing the mixed-use portfolio to absorb temporary weakness in the baseball segment.

And ABH was able to weather that unfavorable schedule and standing up their own broadcast network while maintaining player spending. The organization has the financial room to let the media strategy develop, but that room does not guarantee BravesVision will ultimately produce better economics than the previous television agreement.

The Battery has made the waiting affordable. BravesVision still has to prove the bet was worth it.

(If you’d rather, there’s also a podcast version of this newsletter available on the Braves Today YouTube channel.)