just to be clear... the article does not say MLBN would be 'exclusive too' current EI carriers, just that it would be 'available too' current EI carriers.
This coincides more with what cubswin was saying about MLB securing distribution of the channel than anything else.
thats not how I read it...see below (bolded part)
MLB Net is a seperate 24/7 channel available to ALL subs of the provider that carries it within a certain base package. A sub does not need to sign up for EI to have MLB Net. The provider does, however, have to carry EI in order to carry MLB Net.
I read that as the company has to carry EI to get access to MLB Net