Disney, Apple and Amazon have all submitted bids to become the new broadcast rights owner of the National Football League’s out-of-market Sunday Ticket package. They’re just waiting to find out who wins.
The three companies submitted bids weeks ago, according to people familiar with the matter. The NFL continues to be in discussion with all three bidders as it decides which partner it will choose, said the people, who asked not to be named because the negotiations are private. |
When the NFL signed contracts with CBS and Fox, the deals included language that mandates Sunday Ticket have a premium price so as not to pull too many eyeballs away from the local market Sunday afternoon games acquired by the broadcast networks, three of the people said.
That means any owner of Sunday Ticket rights won’t be able to significantly lower the price on the out-of-market package, which typically costs about $300 per year. |
DirecTV is interested in maintaining a relationship with bars and restaurants… Sunday Ticket is also popular with sports gamblers who want to see multiple games at the same time.
DirecTV would also consider acting as a residential pass-through. Under such an agreement, it could transfer all revenue for Sunday Ticket to the rights owner but still offer it to customers. |
More details in the article.
There were rumors Apple has already won the deal, but that doesn’t appear to be true
Disney, Apple and Amazon keep waiting as NFL considers Sunday Ticket offers - (
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This is a good tool to check prices for broadband in your area. The general rule is you need 20 Mpbs per streaming device. 300 Mbps is more than enough to stream on multiple devices. The national average is about $65 for 300 Mpbs.
Rest assured, of the three major media companies bidding for the rights, all will provide archiving, play from the beginning, and fast forward/rewind capabilities.
With available and price competitive broadband, buying the streaming service the NFL picks will be easy and usable.
If you only want to watch Giants games, you can do so by subscribing to one of the live TV streaming services and use a VPN to use an NY IP and get your local stations from NY.
YouTubeTV and Fubo for $70 or less a month offer 85-100 channels, ample DVR storage, and the streaming to multiple screens at once.
If you own a Fire Stick or Amazon streaming device you can easily install a VPN like Surfshark for a few bucks a month, and safely receive local New York channels.
So if CBS and Fox aren't broadcasting the Sunday day games in 4k, hard to see how one of these companies could force them to do it, they are just a pass through from the original broadcast.
DTV has tons of 4k content, but they can only put in 4k what they are getting from the original broadcast.
There seems to be basically no incentive for fox or cbs to do it, unless somebody else wins broadcasting rights and puts all their games in 4k which would force fox and cbs hand
Would anyone really be surprised if they just continue the same game and say "oh Android users can just access through their browser!".
Such a scenario is obviously better than DTV for those who can't get a dish (HOA), but I don't think it's as good a landing spot as Disney or Amazon. Both of them will be more universal in their approach.
Too bad MLB Advanced media not making a play and expanding to different sports! Their product is just so far ahead of anything out there. But their business model (subscription as main source of revenue, not ads) is restrictive for them.
The other plus, is Disney can package Sunday Ticket on top of Hulu Live TV.
I can easily see an outcome where say a $400 annual package gets you Hulu/Disney/ESPN and Sunday Ticket.