How do you like my idea for simplifying sports coverage on TV: one app for every league, pay for individual games a la carte

The Game Room
, , ,
1

I’ve come up with a shockingly simple solution to the problem of some sports games being on this streaming app, some on that streaming app, some on broadcast TV, all within the same league. It also solves the problem of access to all of the league’s games being tied to an app that also produces other, scripted content. Here it is:

Each league has its own streaming app. Pay for a season pass (all games), or pay a la carte for a specific game (say, $1.99 for a regular-season game, $2.99 for a playoff game, $3.99 for the championship, etc.). Add non-game content, such as analysis, highlight reels, etc., as well.

So in this system, the NFL would be its own app. Pay $whatever for a Season Pass, or if all you want to watch is the Bears-Packers mid-season because you enjoy the rivalry, pay $whatever for that game. Offer single-team packages at a discount: only care about the Rams? Buy the Rams-Only Package that only gives you access to Rams games, for example.

Similarly, MLB would be its own app. The English Premiere League its own app, the Olympics their own app, etc. These apps would not be tied to any other streaming service, so I wouldn’t need to, for example, already have the AppleTV app (or whatever it is) for MLS Season Pass – I could just download the MLS app and go from there.

What about the broadcast networks, you ask? They can put up the money for the rights to provide content for these apps. NBC, for example, could buy the rights to the NBA app for $x million for x years, and renegotiate when the contract is up.

I think this is brilliant beyond words and I’m having a hard time seeing a downside (beyond, perhaps, the apps charging extortionate prices for high-profile events, like the Super Bowl, which you can get for free* on network TV).

*”Free” here means it’s included in the price you pay for your package, be it streaming or whatever. Or “free” if you watch over the air, but really, does anyone even do that anymore?

2

As you might expect, the issue is money.

In some leagues (MLB for example), the team owners want to control the broadcast rights to their team’s games. The Yankees and Dodgers know, for example, that their product is worth more than the Royals. So you might not be surprised to know that the Yankees and Dodgers control their own broadcast rights (except for the handful of national games that the league contracts out) and distribute them through networks/streaming platforms that they own.

MLB owns the Royals rights, so it works pretty much how you would like. MLB Season Pass gets you access to all Royals games, even if you live in KC. But not Yankees games if you live in NY or Dodgers games if you live in LA.

The price for MLB to “buy back” the broadcast rights to the Yankees and Dodgers would be massive.

For other leagues (EPL, NFL) It’s more profitable, by far, for the league to “slice and dice” their packages and sell pieces of it to different distributers. That way they get more money and each of the distributers get subscription fees for fans that want to watch all of the games.

I believe to watch every NFL game in 2025 you needed all of the following: An antenna to get ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC [or cable], 3 Months of ESPN’s new streaming service ($30 three times) [or cable], 3 Months of NFL+ ($7 three times) [or cable], 1 Month of Netflix for Christmas Day ($8), 1 Month of Peacock for a single Saturday Game ($11), A free Twitch Account (or Amazon Prime), A free Youtube Account

[Stolen from Reddit; may not be 100% accurate]

I follow Arsenal FC, and to watch all of their League and Cup matches I need: USA/NBC (cable or equivalent), Peacock (EPL), ESPN+ (FA Cup), Paramount+ (EFL Cup, UEFA CL). It’s bonkers.

Unfortunately, it is worth it for Peacock to pay a huge amount for EPL matches so that they can hook me in their platform paying for all of their other crap. Why would they just offer me the EPL for a lower price? It’s not like I have a choice. And by splitting it between NBC/USA/Peacock I either have to skip the USA-only matches and watch them on delay in the Peacock app, or pay for yet another subscription that comes with tons of content I don’t want.

3

Paramount+ is the worst fucking streaming app I have ever used, and it’s incredibly annoying that I need them to watch champions league. But at least I can get all my other Bundesliga content on one app, ESPN plus.

4

And, as a result, if the NFL were to decide, “we’re going to bring it all under one app,” just for the league and the teams to be making the same amount of money through a single app that they are making today with their network and streaming deals, it would wind up costing fans a helluva lot more than the hypotheticals which the OP threw out there (note: I recognize that @HeyHomie is just putting some numbers in there for examples, but they are undoubtedly far too low for what it would wind up costing):

According to this article, this is how much the NFL brings in every year from its broadcast/streaming partners, under their current contracts:

  • ESPN/ABC (Disney): ~$2.7B per year
  • FOX: ~$2.2B per year
  • CBS (Paramount Global): ~$2.1B per year
  • NBC (Comcast): ~$2.0B per year
  • Amazon (Prime Video): ~$1.0B per year for exclusive Thursday Night Football
  • YouTube TV / Google (2023–2029): ~$2.0B per year for NFL Sunday Ticket. Add-on: a free global stream of the 2025 Week 1 Brazil game.
  • Netflix (2024–2026): ~$75M per game, about $150M total for two Christmas Day games in 2024. Netflix outsourced production to CBS Sports, but took the spotlight. Local markets still got the games free over-the-air.
  • Peacock (2024 Wild Card): ~$110M for a single playoff game, which became the most-streamed live event in U.S. history.
  • Amazon (2025 Wild Card): reported $120–150M for a playoff exclusive, on top of its $1B/year Thursday deal. Amazon also shelled out roughly $100M for the 2023 Black Friday game.

That adds up to about $12.4 billion in revenue per year.

IMO, the NFL isn’t going to go to 100% streaming any time soon, much less consolidating (and the current deals with the main networks run through 2033 anyway). Part of the NFL’s strategy is clearly to get in front of as many eyeballs as possible, and even with cable-cutting, the big networks are still the most efficient and profitable way to do that.

5

You need all that for live games. I don’t know how many years it’s been since I’ve actually watched a game live, other than Superbowls. The closest I come is starting a game an hour late to skip commercials, and then when I catch up to real time I pause it and go putter around on the computer for an hour so I can continue to skip commercials for the rest of the game.

I paid $100 in July for a year of NFL+ Premium. That lets you watch every single game, regardless who carries it, minutes after that game ends. Every game for every team from every network for the entire season and post season.

I find the NFL+ Premium experience notably superior to all other options. It’s very peppy and responsive. My stupid cable system has that crappy cloud DVR bullshit, meaning that fast forward and rewind are sluggish at best. And while I appreciate the Amazon feature where you can catch the highlights from the early part of the game before you start watching live if you come in in the middle, I find it so much simpler and easier to just start watching the game 4 hours after kickoff. I never have to even think about where a game is being broadcast; it’s all on one single, convenient place.

Best $100 I spent last year.

EDIT: My biggest gripe about NFL+ Premium is that the full game replays have chapter marks that are too far apart. Fast forward and rewind skip ahead or backwards something like 24 seconds per click, which is awkward trying to get to the next snap.

However, I have realized that if you start watching the game shortly after it ends, the chapter marks are only 10 seconds apart, which is perfection. Those chapter marks get longer and longer the more time passes. So a few hours after the game ends it may be up to 12 or 14 seconds. The next day around 16 or 18 seconds. So now I’m just watching every game 4 hours after kickoff, which I’ve done all postseason. It’s fantastic.

6

How would people watch games who don’t have an app? Not everyone has smart TVs or the equivalent.

7

Good point! I literally cannot watch prerecorded sports without just looking up the score and giving up. Even the Olympics I really struggle watching not live. So that would be a complete non-starter for me.

As someone correctly pointed out up-thread, in addition to making more money for the leagues, splitting things up across multiple platforms means that nearly every person in America will have at least one option for watching a NFL game, even by accident. That random gal that only watches Start Trek on Paramount+ might flip on the game and suddenly become a fan. The old man that still only watches broadcast TV with an antenna can still watch the local team on Sunday over the air (at least some of the time).

That’s much more valuable to the league than providing a more convenient way for folks that are already fans to watch the games.

8

Very interesting; I hadn’t realized that it was that comprehensive.

I would imagine that a lot of rabid football fans wouldn’t be interested in it, due to the time delay, and a desire (compulsion?) to watch the games in real time. Plus, with the rise of legalized sports betting, and prop bets that you can make during the game, it’s not possible to make those kind of wages on that sort of delay.

9

Dating back to 2009. Meaning if there is any *preseason, regular season or playoff game you want to watch for any team since 2009, it is available. As a Giants fan, it infuriates me that the cutoff isn’t 2 years earlier than that. Really, it should go back to realignment in 2002, but at that point it would just be pissing off Patriots and Ravens fans. But 2009 seems super arbitrary.

*All preseason games are available, but you only get the home broadcast. So for example this year, for the first Giants preseason game (Giants @ Bills) I only got the broadcast from Buffalo. It was super annoying and made it almost pointless to watch since they only ever focused on or even talked about the Bills.

10

Does that mean you actually still sit through commercials? If so, respect. I can’t even wrap my head around that concept.

11

Well, I only really watch NFL, Soccer, and MLB. Both NFL and MLB I typically put the game on in the background and watch in spurts, doing other stuff during commercials or lulls in the action (unless it’s playoffs, and then I typically watch more exclusively).

Soccer, of course, doesn’t have commercials during the action (although some would argue it’s boring enough they would prefer commercials).

I will occasionally pause a “live” MLB game and then catch up by skipping commercials between a few innings. But typically only from the beginning of the game and then I’ll skip ahead if I get spoiled to the score somehow. And hopefully I’ve “caught up” by the time it gets to the late innings.

I just can’t stand non-live sports.