Effectively Wild is Going Freemium
Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley announce a new freemium model for the podcast: From now on, one of their three episodes a week will be available only to Patreon supporters. In this PSA, they lay out their reasons for making the change and explain how it will work. You can also read a written explanation here.
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Well.
I think you accidentally posted this one 8 days early.
What if you are a paid Fangraphs member?
Yeah do I get the freemium EW as a paid FG member in good standing?
Three podcasts a week has always been an absurd clip, happy to support ya
I feel the same. This is the kick in the pants I needed to be a regular supporter.
Seems like one of two things should be true.
Having some Fangraphs content further paywalled beyond the subscription isn’t what was sold to people who subscribed.
I hear you but that just feels like optics. If it helps for you, just think of this as an announcement that they’re cutting back to two podcasts a week. Exact same result for you.
I already pay for both FG and the EW Patreon, and I’m still confused about why a FG-branded podcast is having me go to another payment provider to pay for it.
Razzball is doing this too. I’m a paying subscriber to Razzball, but if I want certain information a day early, I have to go pay for their Patreon. Why aren’t there just different subscription options for everything a site offers? Why are sites pushing people to Patreon to pay for access perks to their site?
Not speaking for David or on behalf of FanGraphs here, but I guess that’s sort of the point: I don’t work for FanGraphs, and the podcast and the Patreon predated the current association with FanGraphs. So that kind of complicates matters, from a financial perspective. Maybe it’s my fault!
Also complicated when it says FanGraphs Staff next to your name. (I know you don’t work for FanGraphs, just pointing out where the confusion get worse)
It just seems odd to me that a podcast branded with FanGraphs is not included with a FanGraphs membership. I understand why that membership would not have purchased a pre-2026 EW Patreon tier of perks, but the situation has now changed. It is disappointing that a FanGraphs membership does not purchase FanGraphs flagship podcast.
My concern isn’t about losing podcast episodes, my concern is that Fangraphs membership was sold as an all in one and now isn’t. When I made my membership decision that was a factor. Next time I will have to consider the risk that csv downloads is the next thing that will be put into the 2nd tier of cost.
I think Effectively Wild is a singular exception, because of the nature of the relationship between the podcast and FanGraphs. (See my comment above and David’s explanation below.) For what it’s worth, we’ve always offered some exclusive content to Effectively Wild Patreon supporters that wasn’t included in a FanGraphs membership.
Yeah my opinion isn’t that you shouldn’t be looking for more revenue. I get that part. I do think that Fangraphs shouldn’t be branding any digital content as a Fangraphs product that their membership doesn’t include.
I definitely see where you’re coming from here. Effectively Wild has always occupied a sort of strange place on the site from a revenue model perspective, and I hope a little transparency might help explain the situation.
Effectively Wild was brought over from Baseball Prospectus in 2017 when Jeff Sullivan came on as co-host. The Patreon supported business model for Effectively Wild pre-dates FanGraphs’ involvement, and the podcast exists as more of a collaborative project between its hosts, one of whom isn’t a FanGraphs employee, and the site.
It has always had separate supporters through Patreon, and those Patreon supporters have always received benefits that are not available to FanGraphs Members, though admittedly, that has not involved main feed episodes before now.
The podcast has also always run ad free, and for various reasons, we would like to keep it that way. (I realize that it isn’t necessarily your problem that we’re reluctant to run ads, but that is the current situation, and it’s as much about the stability of that revenue model as it is the somewhat odious ad options most common for sports podcasts).
I understand that if you’re a Member, this isn’t an ideal situation. But the unfortunate reality is that the price of a FanGraphs Membership just does not include the price of funding a podcast of the length and quality of Effectively Wild. The site currently produces Effectively Wild at a loss, and if we were to factor the cost of making the podcast into a FanGraphs Membership, it would certainly be more expensive, which doesn’t strike us as quite right, since most of our Members are not listeners.
I do acknowledge it’s a bit messy to do it this way, and we have no intention of splitting our product lines in other ways. But Effectively Wild, whether you were aware or not, was always a split product line. I’m sorry we didn’t do a better job of communicating that.
Thank you David and Ben for explaining things. Like I said, I already pay for both and will continue to do so and part of it has always been because I love your work and your transparency with your supporters.
Good luck and best wishes.
n/a
Yeah it makes total sense given the history, I think I would have dropped (or adjusted) the branding though. It’s a bad look for Fangraphs membership to not include all Fangraphs digital content.
David, thank you for the explanation. I understand why pre-2026 a FanGraphs Membership would not have purchased the bonuses available at the main EW Patreon tier.
What I am having trouble understanding, is that EW and FanGraphs are clearly rethinking the revenue model for EW (and based on what Ben and Meg said on the pod, rightfully so). In the course of that rethinking, it seems odd to me that you could not consolidate the Membership and podcast revenue stream.
It seems as though this is set, so I wont spend any more words except to say that this is disappointing, and I hope that FanGraphs will make the paid episodes of EW available to FanGraphs members. Thank you!
Fair point, but I’m more than happy to pay for both as long as I’m able, and still feel like I get more than my money’s worth either way!
This feels reasonable. Honestly I’ve been dragging my feet on joining the patreon for a while. This’ll do it.
RIP Effectively Wild
Fair enough! Won’t really change anything for me – have been happy to financially support the best baseball podcast around for years at this point!
I hate to say it, but $10 a month is just too high.
Are the paid episodes going to be thematically different than the free ones? For example, it would have been odd if this change was made a few months ago and the season previews alternated between free and paid, but in-season may lend itself to this format better.
We talked about that a bit in today’s announcement (both the podcast version and the written version linked from the podcast post above). I suspect we probably won’t partially paywall the preview series next year, though we haven’t definitively planned that far ahead.
I get it that folks who can’t afford to pay $10 ($9 after the discount) per month are getting fewer episodes are not pleased. But for the rest of us, well, I only wish that everyone who wanted money from me approached that desire with the level of transparency, empathy and courtesy as the rollout of this announcement. This should be a case study at business schools of how to treat loyal customers under these circumstances. You will be getting my $.
Meg must really want that espresso machine! Happy to continue supporting the pod.