Most of mainland Europe is on the Central European Timezone (UTC+1), despite the difference in solar time between western Spain and eastern Poland being about 2 hours. Solar time wise western spain should be at ~UTC-0:40, and eastern poland at ~UTC+1:30
I remember as a kid, you had to listen to the radio or watch TV at a certain specific time if you wanted to know what happened in the world. It's weird to think about it now, how radio and tv stations had so much power over people schedules and lives.
I don't generally watch sport, nor follow a team, but when I do it's good sport whether I know the result or not.
For TV shows, some of the same things apply. If your friends and co-workers watch the show the night of, they may talk about it all day. In that case you either find out what happened, or spend the day avoiding contact with other people who watched it already.
Shared experience provides a lot of value for some people, so apparently it's worth the costs for them.
Edit to add: recording TV broadcasts requires some amount of technical ability and expense beyond that to receive a live broadcast. Sporting events often don't have a hard end time, which can confuse some recording software. Usually if a game takes extra time, the end is more exciting.
2. For important postseason games, the experience is communal. I’m either watching with friends or virtually watching with them via group chat. And we’re commenting on literally every play as they happen. It’s a big deal if my live stream is seconds behind theirs.
3. Such postseason games are imbued with urgency, anticipation, and excitement. A serious fan derives a lot of pleasure from the immediacy this requires. It’s nothing like deciding when to watch an episode of Bojack Horseman. When the St. Louis Cardinals are in the postseason, for example, the entire city reflects it. It’s a moment in time, a cultural event. The whole town is talking about it. You can’t decide you’d rather have that experience next month when your schedule is less busy. It’s not up to you.
It can only be experienced real-time.
On the original comment: none of this has anything to do with time zones. Even without time zones, there would be a “time” difference because of the geographical differences. A good “time” to watch on one coast is likely to be a bad one on the other, just because most human beings like to sleep when it’s dark where they are.