Major League Baseball is about to slide in to a mountain of cash.
The TV rights now owned by ESPN, Fox and Turner expire at the end of the 2013 season and bidders are lining up for a chance to take a swing.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” a source familiar with the bidding told the Post.
MLB is “in the catbird seat because five media companies need summer sports programming,” said the source.
CBS has expressed interest in baseball, according to reports, but NBC has the most to gain from an acquisition.
NBC is the fourth-ranked network and has a fledgling cable sports channel, NBC Sports Network, that needs a big property to bolster its midlevel NHL and Tour De France lineup.
NBC has a recent track record as high bidder for sports rights — it paid $4.38 billion to broadcast the next four Olympics and $1.9 billion for 10 more years of the NHL.
The network would like to pair up its hugely popular “Sunday Night Football” series with baseball, according to insiders.
MLB’s current deal with ESPN, Turner and Fox is worth about $711 million per year but the new deal is expected to rise to more than $1 billion.