Major League Baseball Advanced Media LP

Success at a Glance

Baseball fans from around the world are flocking to MLB.com, the official Web site of Major League Baseball. There, visitors can listen to and watch live games and highlights, check scores, buy game tickets, purchase team merchandise and even manage a virtual team. MLB.com is the Internet’s most successful broadband Web portal devoted to professional sports, offering more than one billion minutes of streaming media and over 2,430 full-length games per season to over one billion visitors.

Behind this success is a strategic technology alliance between Major League Baseball Advanced Media (MLBAM) and Sun Microsystems. Sun had worked with MLBAM to design and implement the original infrastructure for MLB.com, all to MLBAM's satisfaction. When the time came to extend the capabilities of the existing site to the new frontier of video and audio content, MLBAM sought a technology partner who could provide the necessary system design, deployment and sustaining services. MLBAM chose Sun to deliver an advanced media platform featuring unparalleled flexibility, sophistication and reliability.

Sun managed the project to build new data centers in New York and Chicago. Sun consultants assisted with the design and implement of a wide range of Sun servers, storage and software. MLBAM brought in Sun Advantage Partner AT&T to provide hosting services for Internet connectivity, vital to ensure broadband connectivity to all 30 ballparks.

The New York data center features more than a hundred Sun Fire servers running the Solaris 9 operating system. The Chicago data center mirrors the New York site to provide enhanced business continuity. Once the data center infrastructures were built, MLB.com engineers installed software applications, including Oracle 9i database which serves as the data repository for all of MLB.com’s information—from player profiles to team histories—and a SAS customer relationship management solution.

To create Web services and software applications such as live Internet broadcasts, digital downloads of all playoff games, live pre-game shows and other expanded broadband capabilities, MLBAM developers rely on components of the Sun Java Enterprise System. Sun Java System Web Server receives and routes requests from Web site visitors using JavaServer Pages (JSP) components. In fact, MLBAM is one of the Internet’s largest dynamic JSP content providers with hundreds of thousands of JSP files active on any given day. MLB.com also uses Sun Cluster 3.0 software for high availability, with good results: The site has experienced no downtime in two years of operation.

Needing to archive every game, MLB.com requires massive storage capabilities. It meets those needs with a digital asset management system based on Sun StorageTek storage systems and tape libraries, and the Sun Digital Asset Management Reference Architecture. Sun StorageTek SAM-FS and QFS software manages shared file and archiving capabilities while Artesia Technologies' TEAMS asset management software provides a more efficient and intuitive interface for MLB.com video producers and Z Microsystems' TEAMS Video Adapter helps MLBAM import, encode and manage audio and video content. The MLB.com digital asset management archive allows users to access and view in real time any media stored in the MLB.com archive.

To maintain the required levels of availability, MLB.com relies on SunSpectrum Platinum and Gold service plans, and uses SunSolve Online to manage patch releases and noncritical support requests. To enhance efficiency and maintain skills, the MLBAM IT team takes Sun training courses in Sun Fire server and Solaris administration.

Already, MLB.com is averaging six million visitors daily with a record-breaking 15 million visitors in a single day. And, the Web site typically serves up 10 million page views per day with a record-breaking 90 million views delivered during Game Seven of the 2004 American League playoffs. Going forward, MLB.com will feature as many as 15 live games daily during the 2005 season and more than 6,000 audio-streamed games over the course of the year.

The alliance with Sun is helping MLBAM to realize its bold initiative for reaching more fans and generating more excitement while producing additional revenue. And that can only be good news for the growth of America’s national pastime.