The Future of NFL Viewing

[olbriar]

Today I became aware that Thursday Night Football will now and for the next 11 years only be streamed by Amazon Prime Video. I am a prime subscriber so I'm not really impacted. However, a lot of NFL viewers are not prime members. This is only the beginning. This is the last year that DirecTv has the exclusive rights to the out of market NFL games. According to Roger Goodell, next year all out of market games will be on a streaming service. Apple, Disney, and Amazon are bidding to have exclusive rights. Perhaps this is a progression but perhaps not. It will okay with me until I have to have this service for these games and another service for some other games. I will still have my TV service that I pay dearly for as well as some streaming services including Prime. If Apple or Disney win the bid for the NFL Ticket, I will have to subscribe to that service or miss some of the games. They are pricing the fan out of viewing IMO. I personally think it's bad for the game and I know it's bad for the NFL fan's wallet.
What's your take on our streaming sports future?

 

[Clementine_3]

That's what MLB is doing/starting now. Prime carries a weekly game and Apple picks some up too. I went on a Twitter rant lol. I have prime but may drop it due to the price hike, I will never get Apple anything, I don't get cable so the Fox and ESPN games are already out for me. I buy the mlb.tv package but that now carries fewer games.
I still get enough baseball but NFL has far fewer games and I would be beyond furious if I watched football. It's out of control with all the subscriptions and hoops just to watch TV.

 

[ozonetrooper]

There are underground steaming services that one can subscribe to and received most everything on tv today. The sports channels are more than one can comprehend, as well as other "entertainment"

so I am told ..

 

[tube517]

NFL streaming is already in progress.

Amazon Prime
Peacock (NBC)
Paramount + (CBS)
FOX has their own streaming.
NFL+ is the new streaming platform for the league. I don't know much about it.
TubiTV has some NFL content but I don't think they have live games.
Yahoo Sports shows some live games but I'm not sure about this year.

 

[olbriar]

College basketball is another splintered viewing sport. I had to subscribe to ESPN+ to follow my teams. It wasn't a big deal when I was still working and the cost was five bucks a month. It is now basically ten bucks a month starting in September. I only use the service to catch a few games. It's not worth $120 a year of my retirement money so I dropped it.

I can somewhat understand the streaming game for professional sports. The money that changes hands in the industry is staggering. Someone must feed that revenue stream and it should be the end consumer. Taking most of the viewing options out of the main stream viewers pocket makes sense... especially for the non sport viewer. I don't understand the non professional sports streaming gouge.

 

[tube517]

That's what MLB is doing/starting now. Prime carries a weekly game and Apple picks some up too. I went on a Twitter rant lol. I have prime but may drop it due to the price hike, I will never get Apple anything, I don't get cable so the Fox and ESPN games are already out for me. I buy the mlb.tv package but that now carries fewer games.
I still get enough baseball but NFL has far fewer games and I would be beyond furious if I watched football. It's out of control with all the subscriptions and hoops just to watch TV.

For the MLB do you have Tmobile? Tmobile gives a year susbscription to MLB.TV for free in their Tmobile Tuesday deals. I can watch every game on my phone, tablet or TV

 

[olbriar]

NFL streaming is already in progress.

Amazon Prime
Peacock (NBC)
Paramount + (CBS)
FOX has their own streaming.
NFL+ is the new streaming platform for the league. I don't know much about it.
TubiTV has some NFL content but I don't think they have live games.
Yahoo Sports shows some live games but I'm not sure about this year.

I've seen the sports banner invitation to hop on the the NFL+ stream. I haven't checked it out. It will be interesting to see what they offer and at what price.

With so many jumping into the streaming game and the big players bidding for exclusive rights, it's obvious to me that stream viewing is our future. I bet cable and dish services are crying the blues. I suspect the sports bars will suffer a financial impact as well.

I'm such a sports nut and my life long friends are not. When we talk TV they are staggered at the amount I already pay to be entertained.
They stream or over the air all of their viewing at a fraction of what I spend. Sports is all I watch. I detest all other programming. They, on the other hand, could not be paid enough to watch a game. Each to their own likes but why does a sports fan have to sell the farm to pay for his entertainment?

I have some hope that when the dust settles on sports streaming that it is an affordable option. I seriously doubt it however.

 

[Clementine_3]

NFL streaming is already in progress.

Amazon Prime
Peacock (NBC)
Paramount + (CBS)
FOX has their own streaming.
NFL+ is the new streaming platform for the league. I don't know much about it.
TubiTV has some NFL content but I don't think they have live games.
Yahoo Sports shows some live games but I'm not sure about this year.

Forgot about Peacock and Paramount. Seriously, how many services do you have to have just to watch a game? It's totally out of control I say. For baseball anyway they are complaining that viewership is down, well this isn't helping lol.

For the MLB do you have Tmobile? Tmobile gives a year susbscription to MLB.TV for free in their Tmobile Tuesday deals. I can watch every game on my phone, tablet or TV

No, Verizon. I've been getting mlb.tv for years and it's served me mostly well (except stupid blackouts), my son watched too so it's worth it to me.

 

[olbriar]

Forgot about Peacock and Paramount. Seriously, how many services do you have to have just to watch a game? It's totally out of control I say. For baseball anyway they are complaining that viewership is down, well this isn't helping lol.

A very good question. The list is substantial and growing.

Baseball games seem to always run over the projected time slot. When recording, I've taken to adding an hour so I'm not shorted out of seeing the entire game. The game is getting borderline boring for all of the stoppage of play. It's not the game I watched growing up.. and old The game certainly doesn't need to make it more difficult to watch. Question: how do you record a streamed broadcast? I very often record and cut commercials in my sports viewing.

 

[tube517]

So I just read Walmart+ is going to have a partnership with Paramount+. They really want to compete w/Amazon

 

[olbriar]

Big pockets get bigger!

 

[Clementine_3]

Big pockets get bigger!

Indeed. And there are so many pockets now...

 

[olbriar]

Indeed. And there are so many pockets now...

I think that's what worries me the most. Streaming is okay but I don't want to subscribe to a dozen services to watch sports. I'm already out the expense of upgrading modem and router as well as service to accommodate streaming. I can't drop my TV service and remain married. They are pinching me out of the market... I feel it coming.

 

[Clementine_3]

It really is getting ridiculous.

 

[Torrid]

I have been wondering for years who was going to get the NFL Sunday Ticket package when DirecTV's rights ended. The only difference is, when I first wondered this, streaming was not the thing it is now. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out.

 

[tube517]

I have been wondering for years who was going to get the NFL Sunday Ticket package when DirecTV's rights ended. The only difference is, when I first wondered this, streaming was not the thing it is now. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out.

Whoever gets it is going to shell out some big bucks.

Look at the announcers getting huge deals.

Al Michaels has gone to Amazon for TNF games.

Joe Buick and Troy Aikman are on MNF on ESPN.

Mike Tirico takes over SNF on NBC/Peacock from Al Michaels.

 

[ozonetrooper]

Ray Wiley Hubbard once said, "the problem with irony is not everyone gits it !"

I do not do sports, my streaming service provides access to all sports at no extra charge, and I have never even looked at them ...




I bid a good weekend to all !

 

[olbriar]

For those that watched the game, what was your take on the first streamed NFL game? I thought the game coverage was fine. The picture was great. I thought the show behind the game needed some polish. Maybe they will improve as the season progresses.

 

[ocnbrze]

For those that watched the game, what was your take on the first streamed NFL game? I thought the game coverage was fine. The picture was great. I thought the show behind the game needed some polish. Maybe they will improve as the season progresses.

i watched the game on Fox on Direct TV. did not have to stream it.

 

[olbriar]

i watched the game on Fox on Direct TV. did not have to stream it.

I did not know Fox had the game. Will they have the rest of the Thursday night games? My brother-in-law, a huge Chiefs fan, subscribed to Prime JUST to watch their game tonight.

 

[treb1797]

For those that watched the game, what was your take on the first streamed NFL game? I thought the game coverage was fine. The picture was great. I thought the show behind the game needed some polish. Maybe they will improve as the season progresses.

I thought it went well. There were alot of people complaining on Twitter about buffering issues, but I had no problems.

 

[olbriar]

I thought it went well. There were alot of people complaining on Twitter about buffering issues, but I had no problems.

I didn't have any buffering issues. I thought the stream was stellar actually. That was likely a provider problem. I'm glad I had none of that.

 

[treb1797]

Interesting....

 

[Clementine_3]

'They' better figure this whole sports thing out before it's too late, it's not getting any better so far.
I have no idea what the answer is but I'm pretty sure this isn't it.

 

[ozonetrooper]

I use IPTV for my services and my locals out of Houston have been taking a beating by my net provider ... Xfinity ...

They are fine tuning a way to buffer/block the streams and it is only getting more refined, I have been using this set up for a few years now and only in the past year have they started playing with the stream and now have it refined to buffer things like sports and prime time shows.

The game was on my local CBS station out of Houston Tx and it was being buffered hard. (we have 4 locals and xfinity started with one and now buffer all four of them),

I watched it from a local station out of Alabama with no VPN or buffering ....

Fok Xfinity !