The Japan Fair Trade Commission on Wednesday warned Nippon Professional Baseball over its confiscation of media passes from Fuji Television Network.
The antitrust watchdog said that such moves could violate the antimonopoly law, urging NPB to prevent any recurrence.
Last fall, Fuji TV broadcast a digest of the World Series, which was won by the Los Angeles Dodgers and star batter Shohei Ohtani, at the same time the Japan Series was being aired by a rival broadcaster.
NPB confiscated Fuji TV’s media passes for the Japan Series, saying that the broadcaster’s actions seriously damaged its relationship of trust with the baseball governing body.
According to the FTC, Fuji TV’s coverage activities, including for the Japan Series, were restricted from Oct. 26 to Nov. 10 last year following the confiscation.
Fuji TV broadcast the third game of the Japan Series as scheduled, although NPB had tried to get another broadcaster to air the contest between the Yokohama DeNA BayStars and the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks.
The FTC concluded that the NPB’s actions may constitute obstruction of transactions, prohibited by the antimonopoly law, by making broadcasters think twice about dealing with MLB, which competes with NPB for the attention of baseball fans in Japan.
Meanwhile, the FTC did not recognize NPB’s actions as violating the antimonopoly law, because Fuji TV broadcast the World Series except on the day of the third game and the media passes were confiscated only for a short time.
When receiving a notice of a draft warning from the FTC last month, NPB described it as unacceptable, saying there were serious errors in the commission’s recognition and evaluation of facts.
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