# Now that D* is about to likely lose Sunday Ticket…



## wilbur_the_goose (Aug 16, 2006)

What’s next? Sunday Ticket was the only reason I’ve remained a D* client. Been with them since 1996, and I’m emotionally ready to move. 

I loved the pre-ATT DirecTV, but the Blue Orb killed the service. So damn sad.

I’ll be looking at alternatives casually Odds are probably 25% I’ll stay, but the poor customer service has killed my enthusiasm.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

wilbur_the_goose said:


> What’s next? Sunday Ticket was the only reason I’ve remained a D* client.


DIRECTV still has one more season on their contract.

I'm not convinced that the pay TV landscape is going to remain unchanged by this time next year but it is never to early to acquaint yourself with the state-of-the-art so you're not starting from nothing.


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

The only thing I am pretty sure of is that the NFL is interested in the deal that will give them the most money. All the other stuff as far as who has it, how it's distributed, how much customers get charged for it, is irrelevant. So, ask the question of who do you think will offer the NFL the most money ? 

I got my first DirecTV system in September 1994, and have had Sunday Ticket since DirecTV offered it. I hope they continue to offer is but if they don't I'll look elsewhere. It's business.....for them and for me.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

There's a bunch of these NFL contract threads...

My 2 things.. not everyone has "good" broadband for streaming stuff 

A streaming provider won't give the same promos and discount D* gives to their customers . 

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## lparsons21 (Mar 4, 2006)

dtv757 said:


> There's a bunch of these NFL contract threads...
> 
> My 2 things.. not everyone has "good" broadband for streaming stuff
> 
> ...


True, streaming providers don’t tend to do individual discounts or promos.
But realistically D* is losing money on NFLST and shedding subscribers, so how long do you think they will keep doing it?


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

dtv757 said:


> There's a bunch of these NFL contract threads...


We can approach this from a perspective. Instead of rehashing whether or not DIRECTV will have NFL Sunday Ticket we are discussing what will happen if they don't.

I believe most people will make the decision when they find out where Sunday Ticket goes. Best case would be if multiple carriers offered the package including DIRECTV - then one would just decide if the rest of DIRECTV is worth the remaining cost. If DIRECTV doesn't carry the package there will be some people who follow the package.


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## bjlc (Aug 20, 2004)

i will stay if they give me my east and west coast channels back


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

I'm staying no way I'm putting that cable video service in my house.. 

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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

James Long said:


> We can approach this from a perspective. Instead of rehashing whether or not DIRECTV will have NFL Sunday Ticket we are discussing what will happen if they don't.


It isn't a matter of _if_. DIRECTV's intention is clear and the NFL is actively looking for anyone else who can handle it (in the form of regular payments to the NFL) to step up with the highest bid.

What will happen _when_ NFLST goes away is quite a few more subscribers than historically suggested will jump ship. Maybe we see an additional million residential subscribers lost on top of the regular exodus because they can't buy or otherwise wrangle the package anymore. A good chunk of the NFLST revenue comes from commercial accounts and it may be possible that DIRECTV salvages some of the commercial establishments (and some of the residential) through their other sports programming but I'd imagine that many of the DIRECTV signs will be peeled off.

While DIRECTV seems disinterested in new DBS subscribers, removing the option of NFLST (free or otherwise) is a pretty huge downer. Let's face it, three months of modern movie channel suites doesn't have the appeal that it once did. Having access to a more substantial RSN portfolio is about all that's left.


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## forecheck (Jun 13, 2002)

I assume he has better sources than most people here, but Sports Business Journals' John Ourand says DirecTv still wants Sunday Ticket in his predictions for 2022









Sports Media: Take them to the bank: My predictions for ’22


Next year is going to be filled with big deals for big money. One theme in all of these predictions: Digital media companies will not be involved in the sports business in a significant way. Instead, it will be the traditional media companies that continue to position themselves for the...




www.sportsbusinessjournal.com







> Amazon buys a nearly 50% stake in the NFL’s media properties.
> Amazon executives have made it clear that they want to deepen their relationship with the NFL. They have been active in negotiating a deal
> to have a less than 50% stake in NFL Network, NFL RedZone and NFL.com. This deal will close in the first quarter. But it will not include Sunday Ticket.
> 
> ...


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

It doesn't matter what DirecTV wants. It matters how AT&T feels about it.


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

John Ourand is one of the best-connected sources in sports media, so his opinion is probably way more informed than any of ours, but it is just that, an opinion. At this point the only thing that would really surprise me is any provider has exclusivity.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

forecheck said:


> I assume he has better sources than most people here, but Sports Business Journals' John Ourand says DirecTv still wants Sunday Ticket in his predictions for 2022


Maybe, maybe not. I'll bet you that nobody outside of the management of DIRECTV, TPG, AT&T and the NFL know what's really going on. Ourand and Swanni may be the only ones backing this bet.

The Chairman of the Board of DIRECTV has gone on record as not wanting to continue the current arrangement and that carries considerably more weight for me.

Even if DIRECTV resold NFL ST, chances seem pretty thin that anyone who is now getting it for free won't be doing so going forward so that pretty much wipes the lipstick off.


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## lparsons21 (Mar 4, 2006)

Personally i don’t think anyone will want an exclusive deal for NFL at the prices that have been bandied about.
I think the NFL organization is in for a rude shock in the near future.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

glrush said:


> John Ourand is one of the best-connected sources in sports media, so his opinion is probably way more informed than any of ours, but it is just that, an opinion.


Craig Moffat tells everyone who will listen the same thing about himself with respect to the entire media industry. That doesn't make him omniscient.


> At this point the only thing that would really surprise me is any provider has exclusivity.


This is in line with the NFL's expressed wishes but if we're talking about someone like Amazon, what does "exclusive" mean?

The most exclusive of the competitors is arguably Apple and the only thing they really have going for them is container loads of cash.


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## forecheck (Jun 13, 2002)

harsh said:


> Maybe, maybe not. I'll bet you that nobody outside of the management of DIRECTV, TPG, AT&T and the NFL know what's really going on. Ourand and Swanni may be the only ones backing this bet.


I agree mostly with that, I just know that "off the record" conversations are pretty common with reporters so thinking he has had to hear something to come out with the prediction. Maybe I am a little biased because in my opinion, the DirecTv/ESPN+ combo makes the most sense for the consumer, although maybe not the most "cents" for the NFL  Although as someone who only watches RedZone, I would probably be better off with DirecTv losing it completely so hopefully we would finally get the NFL's RedZone in the sports package.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

forecheck said:


> I agree mostly with that, I just know that "off the record" conversations are pretty common with reporters so thinking he has had to hear something to come out with the prediction.


If someone offered to the World what you just told them in confidence, I'd imagine that's the last time you would be sharing NDA information with them. Any such disclosure is a major breach of negotiation protocol and has been prosecuted in the courts quite vigorously in the past. See more at "bad faith negotiation".


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## SamC (Jan 20, 2003)

Exclusivity is 100% required for the deal to work for the NFL. 

The other sports simply make their OOM packages available to all, and split the profits with the provider. Not the NFL. DirecTV LOSES MONEY on the ST deal. It pays MORE to the NFL than it can take in. And since 95+% of people COULD have DirecTV if they wanted it, the number of ST subscribers is not going to change that much no matter who or how many providers there are. 

DirecTV justifies this by a predicate. That is the key to the whole ST business model. There must be somethingf else that you have to get first. For DirecTV that was the basic service. For Apple, that would be either an Apple product or Apple Plus. For Amazon, its Prime. Etc. 

All talk of non-exclusivity lacks the basic understanding that no provider would pay one cent more than they could make back in sales in a non-exclusive setting.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

SamC said:


> Exclusivity is 100% required for the deal to work for the NFL.


I disagree.

What works for the NFL is a regular and rather large income. They don't really care how they come by it as long as it is there. That's the whole point of looking for a new partner who will be handling all of the gory details. The fact that the NFL was willing to suffer along with the number of eyeballs that DIRECTV could offer is evidence that exposure wasn't a critical criteria as long as the NFL got their vigorish.


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## JoeTheDragon (Jul 21, 2008)

the NFL also wants the commercial part to work and sat tv works well for them as the bandwidth to stream 8+ hd feeds is an lot and they will also need to maybe even upgrade the Matrix Switchers to have more in puts as one box per TV makes bandwith even more of an issue. and WIFI may not work to well for 8+ HD feeds vs e-net.


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## SamC (Jan 20, 2003)

harsh said:


> I disagree.
> 
> What works for the NFL is a regular and rather large income.


Correct, which is why they sell the package as an exclusive for more than the the customer can make back.



> That's the whole point of looking for a new partner who will be handling all of the gory details. The fact that the NFL was willing to suffer along with the number of eyeballs that DIRECTV.


The NFL has no “partner” vis ST. It has a customer. 

As to the “number of eyeballs”, that would be something like 95% of the country, which is how many people CAN get the service if they wanted it. The idea that some random guy is setting in his recliner watching some crap game because he has sworn to be damed if he ever dumped cable for DBS, is just not accurate.

Thinking anyone will pay one cent more for ST than they can expect to make back, on a non-exclusive basis, is just a basic misunderstanding of math.


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## compnurd (Apr 23, 2007)

JoeTheDragon said:


> the NFL also wants the commercial part to work and sat tv works well for them as the bandwidth to stream 8+ hd feeds is an lot and they will also need to maybe even upgrade the Matrix Switchers to have more in puts as one box per TV makes bandwith even more of an issue. and WIFI may not work to well for 8+ HD feeds vs e-net.


NFL could care less. If Amazon gives them 4 billion a year thats all they want.. How that effects commercial places with bandwidth or whatever is someone elses problem


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

Non exclusivity increases the total subscriber count. Today there are some people who might get NFLST but can't because it is only on Directv. If it was exclusive to Apple or Amazon or whoever the same would apply.

There are levels of exclusivity, too. They could offer commercial exclusivity, and residential exclusivity. They could offer residential streaming exclusivity and residential linear exclusivity.

Compared to what they make from all the other stuff, NFLST is fairly small. If they can't make more from NFLST's next out of market contract than they are currently from AT&T it isn't a big deal for them, because they are making so much more from the Sunday/Monday/Thursday stuff. They might be willing to accept less in exchange for something else, like better metrics about who is watching which they can't get as good as data from linear but can from streaming.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

The commercial establishments will do what they have to do to make it work if it is important to them. I'm not particularly swayed by this argument.

I don't buy that this is a priority for the NFL. I'm betting they'd be just as happy to have viewers watching at home.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

SamC said:


> Thinking anyone will pay one cent more for ST than they can expect to make back, on a non-exclusive basis, is just a basic misunderstanding of math.


The key to the NFL getting an exclusive deal is finding a company willing to show them the money. If no one steps up to give the NFL what they feel the package is worth what do you expect the NFL to do? If the highest bidder offers $1 billion and not a penny more do you expect the NFL to say "that's the best we can do" and accept the deal? I don't. I expect the NFL will follow the path that brings them the most money ... and while DIRECTV was their cash cow paying $1.5 billion for the past few years that cow has dried up and won't be giving milk a year from now.

The NFL cannot force DIRECTV nor any other company to pay for the exclusive rights. They are not all powerful.


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## SamC (Jan 20, 2003)

slice1900 said:


> Non exclusivity increases the total subscriber count. Today there are some people who might get NFLST but can't because it is only on Directv.


If you want NFLST, you call the nice lady at 1 800 DIRECTV, she will get somebody out real quick to instal DirecTV. 

Yes, we can knit pick about the, statistically insignificant, handful of people who cannot get DBS, but remember there is an internet solution for those few people. 

Again, the idea that some hardheaded grouchy old man is sitting in his recliner somewhere watching a crap game because, by gum, he has had cable since he got back from Korea and he ain’t changing, is just not accurate. 


> If it was exclusive to Apple or Amazon or whoever the same would apply.


It would? While, yes, there are people who don’t have the internet speed to really support the service, and that number is bigger than the number of people who cannot get DBS, its still not that big a deal, and the only way around that is for it to be on cable, which isn’t happening. 

The number of people who currently have ST is something like 99% of the people who want it and can afford it.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

SamC said:


> Yes, we can knit pick about the, statistically insignificant, handful of people who cannot get DBS, but remember there is an internet solution for those few people.


I'd be willing to bet your "statistically insignificant" is way off base. 36% of the US population rents their homes and I'd imagine a sizeable fraction of those are effectively prohibited access to a satellite signal. Even homeowners that would have to do battle with HOAs is probably significant.

The streaming solution has some quirky qualifications (i.e. having been "verified as unable" to use DBS absent LoS, located in certain metropolitan areas or in an identified "select" MDU).

Those who don't have access to broadband is surely a much smaller number.


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## WestDC (Feb 9, 2008)

For me They can Lose the NFL for good


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## Claude A Greiner (Dec 8, 2018)

Directv won’t allow the NFL to be dropped from their platform. 

When the time comes they will be given the option as an exclusive deal and the option to allow the sale to other providers. 

Depending on what those numbers are is what Directv will decide to do. 

Each subscriber has a value. I’m sure Directv will run a model to try to determine what the subscriber loss would be vs any potential savings opening it to other providers. 

I think we will see a hybrid version where it remains exclusive to commercial establishments such as Bars, but they will open it to competition in residential. 

Whatever Directv ends up paying, I am sure the same deal will be offered to cable, and dish network. 

I can tell you I doubt you’ll ever see the NFL ticket on Dish. Cable companies may opt in, but they have all gotten along just fine all these years without it. 

The only way it’s going to work for any other cable company is if the NFL sold Sunday ticket on a per subscriber basis. However the NFL is so used to getting a billion dollar flat rate, I doubt they are going to put up with a pay as you sell it model 

I think they would stand to make less money if they opened it up as a pay as you go basis. 

I think what will happen is Directv is going to give the NFL a take it or leave it offer and possibly allow the NFL or Amazon for example have the streaming rights. 

But seriously think about this for a minute. We all know it will never be on Dish as long as Charlie owns the company. 

No cable company is going to get an exclusive deal since they don’t cover the entire country. It would have to be Comcast/spectrum/Cox and a few others who went in it together. 

Then you just cut out all the other customers who are not in those providers foot prints. 

You really need another satellite provider, which is Dish, but Dish will never agree to pay a flat rate. 

So only thing that makes sense is Directv continue to carry it on a non exclusive basis. NFL is allowed to sell the streaming rights or make a deal with a streaming provider. 

If the cable company wants in, they can do it, but will likely have to pay what Directv paid which is unlikely considering their coverage area 


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Claude A Greiner said:


> But seriously think about this for a minute. We all know it will never be on Dish as long as Charlie owns the company.


No. That is your opinion, possibly shared by others but your opinion is not fact or knowledge.

If NFL ST becomes a non-exclusive I expect DISH to offer it alongside the other league packages. With the absence of RSNs DISH needs to rely on the league packages and national channel sports more than DIRECTV or other providers. I agree that it is unlikely that DISH will pursue NFL Sunday Ticket as an exclusive - the NFL is too greedy (or needy if you don't like the term greedy).

One thing to remember is that the games that make up NFL Sunday Ticket are the property of the NFL. They are not the property of DIRECTV. The NFL will remain the decision maker as to how those games are distributed. As an example look at DIRECTV's push to expand distribution of NFL Sunday Ticket to what is now DIRECTV stream. The NFL said no and the package remains satellite only with minimal exceptions. DIRECTV's exclusive doesn't give them the right to redistribute the package on other ways than those allowed by the NFL.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

Claude A Greiner said:


> Directv won’t allow the NFL to be dropped from their platform.


Unless DIRECTV is the successful bidder for exclusive rights, it isn't up to them who gets to carry NFLST.


> No cable company is going to get an exclusive deal since they don’t cover the entire country. It would have to be Comcast/spectrum/Cox and a few others who went in it together.


There are a few cable companies that have a much wider reach than DIRECTV and joint ventures have been entered into before.


> You really need another satellite provider, which is Dish, but Dish will never agree to pay a flat rate.


The current exclusive deal is flat rate and the new deal may be as well but that doesn't mean that the successful bidder must resell the product at flat rate pricing. I'd expect that going direct to the rights holder via streaming would be an option.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

A cable co with a bigger footprint than D* ??

Xfinity is the largest and they not larger than D* as far as footprint. They probably have more subs now due to the massive coord cuts... 

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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

dtv757 said:


> A cable co with a bigger footprint than D* ??


The issue isn't geographical footprint because not everyone inside the service area can get DBS service. This issue is how many subscribers each company can reach.

Doing away with NFLST exclusivity certainly isn't going to boost DIRECTV's DBS subscriber numbers. Having alternatives is likely to cause some significant hurt.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

James Long said:


> We can approach this from a perspective. Instead of rehashing whether or not DIRECTV will have NFL Sunday Ticket we are discussing what will happen if they don't.
> 
> I believe most people will make the decision when they find out where Sunday Ticket goes. Best case would be if multiple carriers offered the package including DIRECTV - then one would just decide if the rest of DIRECTV is worth the remaining cost. If DIRECTV doesn't carry the package there will be some people who follow the package.


Let's imagine that DTV loses NFLST completely (at least for residential viewers). If that happens, I think it will almost certainly be because it becomes exclusively available as an add-on to one particular streaming provider, whether that's ESPN+ or Prime Video or Apple TV+. I highly, highly doubt that NFLST will end up striking another exclusive deal as an add-on to some MVPD other than DTV (e.g. Comcast, Charter, YouTube TV, etc.).

What I'm getting at is that I don't think anyone will find themselves _forced_ to leave DTV to continue getting NFLST. As long as they have broadband service, they can just download the appropriate app and subscribe to stream NFLST. It's not like they'll have to opt to go with a _different_ cable/pay TV service in lieu of DTV.

But OTOH, what would happen is that a not-insignificant number of NFLST-loving DTV subs will find that they have options. They're no longer forced to keep that satellite dish on the roof. How many DTV sat customers do we think exist now? Probably something like 12-13 million. (As of 6/30/21, AT&T had 15.4 million customers between satellite, Uverse TV and what is now called DTV Stream.) I'd bet there's at least 500k folks who stick with DTV _only_ so they can continue getting NFLST (many of them at no additional cost beyond what they pay for their base DTV package). Once DTV dumps NFLST, they'll dump DTV and finally make the switch to the cheaper YouTube TV or DTV Stream for their cable TV service. Or they'll ditch cable TV completely and go with a combination of streaming apps and OTA antenna. Either way, they'll get NFLST from whichever streaming service carries it and be done with satellite TV.

So if DTV loses NFLST -- or even if it just is no longer the exclusive residential provider for the service -- I think we'll see a larger than usual decline in DTV subscribers in 2023.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

Not sure if this is the correct thread but ... 

Let's say it goes to a streaming thing ... those streaming things have HUGE delays even compared to D* 

Imaging now most states have sports betting and issues that may cause.

Person places a bet but his streaming TV thing.. is 90 seconds behind causing chaos ..

Or as happens now folks get fantasy alerts before they see it on the streaming tv..

Also imagine the cost its bad enough we gotta pay a la carte for like , espn +, peacock, Paramount plus etc . What will NFL ST be $600 or something insane . On top of the cost of espn/disney or what ever streaming thing ...


I'm venting sorry if I dont make sense lol 


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## AngryManMLS (Jan 30, 2014)

ESPN+ is getting very close to some of the feeds DirecTV had on MLS Direct Kick this last season... by roughly 1-2 seconds difference. So yes streaming is improving slowly over time in regards to lagging behind traditional live TV.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

dtv757 said:


> Imaging now most states have sports betting and issues that may cause.


Is there some form of gambling that has a "post time" within 90 seconds of the start of an event?


> Or as happens now folks get fantasy alerts before they see it on the streaming tv.


Those can surely be turned off for the duration of the event.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

I remember someone was saying during the game some bets or something changed in the middle of the game .

I forgot what its called but something like it a player does X You win... parlay ?? 

And it can change 


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

NashGuy said:


> What I'm getting at is that I don't think anyone will find themselves _forced_ to leave DTV to continue getting NFLST.


This is certainly true, but how many are maintaining their DIRECTV subscriptions simply because it is the only path to having the _option_ of NFLST in their home? The monthly bill for a DIRECTV package is relativey big one in this market that is becoming less and less interested in linear TV options (and not just because the programming stinks on ice).


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

NashGuy said:


> So if DTV loses NFLST -- or even if it just is no longer the exclusive residential provider for the service -- I think we'll see a larger than usual decline in DTV subscribers in 2023.


I have no doubt there will be a decline, a bump down of some size due to customers having options or DIRECTV not being that option. But I do doubt that we will see it. Apparently owners TPG and AT&T feel they no longer need to tell investors and the public how many subscribers they have left.

Once DIRECTV takes the hit for losing the NFLST exclusive I expect they will get back to their normal unpublished level of decline. But I believe they have done the math. They are not getting $1.5 billion in value from having NFL Sunday Ticket as an exclusive and the NFL doesn't want to sell an exclusive for less.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

dtv757 said:


> I remember someone was saying during the game some bets or something changed in the middle of the game .


I did some web searches and found the terms "in-game betting" and "live betting" ("in-play betting"). In-game is where the odds change at TV commercials and time outs and live betting is play-by-play. In any event, these bets are entirely new wagers on the game's outcome rather than being updated wagers. I'd imagine that if you're live betting, you're probably watching the odds more than you're watching the game.

A parlay is somewhat like a trifecta. You chose a number of winners under a single bet and every team you pick must be successful (beat the spread or win the game as is appropriate).


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

Yea ... so with streaming stuff being delayed would cause issues with that or by time someone presses submit the bet/wager or what ever would change..

Idk I don't do the sports bets but was just naming something impacted by streaming tv delays. 

In against NFL ST going to a streaming thing but thats just me ...


Re pricing ... my D* bill is like 100-150 cheaper than the local cable co . I would be paying 200+ if I had cable co... not to mention no 4K ..


But anyways ill let everyone continue. 




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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

dtv757 said:


> I forgot what its called but something like it a player does X You win... parlay ??
> 
> And it can change


The ads I have seen are for "prop" bets - or proposition betting. They are usually live and require instant response to get in or not. These kind of bets are "will X make this field goal" "will team X kick or go for two points". Things that could easily be over in real life before a delayed stream carried the video.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

James Long said:


> The ads I have seen are for "prop" bets - or proposition betting. *They are usually live and require instant response to get in or not.* These kind of bets are "will X make this field goal" "will team X kick or go for two points". Things that could easily be over in real life before a delayed stream carried the video.


Yeah something that has to be done before the event takes place. Otherwise you could be at a football game and have your bet ready to bet that "X makes this field goal" and once the ball goes through the uprights click the submit button. No way the gambling houses would allow a loophole like that. I'm sure they have all of the loopholes closed that could be based on time delays. They are not in the business of losing money.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

harsh said:


> This is certainly true, but how many are maintaining their DIRECTV subscriptions simply because it is the only path to having the _option_ of NFLST in their home? The monthly bill for a DIRECTV package is relativey big one in this market that is becoming less and less interested in linear TV options (and not just because the programming stinks on ice).


Yes, I agree and explained all that in the remainder of my post above from which you quoted.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

More than likely the live betting apps will simply stick with access via smart phones and other minimal delay devices. For example, you will get an alert in the app for a prop bet and the app will give you a few seconds to make your instant bet. It will simply be spoilers for what is going on via your TV or streaming. (It already is for TV since there is always a delay, even if watching OTA. Satellite and streaming just adds more delay.)

If the betting companies provide their own streams they can still cut off accepting the props before the actual event occurs (or doesn't occur). The betting would need to be handled outside of the video stream for best results. They would not want an on screen popup to say "$20 this guy makes or misses the field goal click make or miss to play" after the bet window closes.

These instant impulse bets are lucrative for the betting companies. Seconds to decide whether or not to take a chance. People susceptible to impulse buying may become victims.


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## B. Shoe (Apr 3, 2008)

dtv757 said:


> Not sure if this is the correct thread but ...
> 
> Let's say it goes to a streaming thing ... those streaming things have HUGE delays even compared to D*
> 
> ...


This is a rabbit hole I probably shouldn't go down, but as someone who regularly dabbles in sports gambling and has watched NFLST solely through the streaming product for the past four seasons, allow me to try and dispel some things here:

They're already doing NFLST through streaming. It's not "going to a streaming thing", because it's already here. Your NFLST subscription through DIRECTV allows you to access the app, which is also a DIRECTV product. We keep talking about "if it goes to streaming", but it's already been happening, and is a pretty solid product in its current format. Even better than watching via satellite, in some regards.
The NFLST live stream is nowhere near 90 seconds behind, or even 60 seconds. At most, it's about ten seconds. Everyone is watching on some sort of delay. I still got fantasy alerts ahead of plays back when I was subscribed to DIRECTV. There's genuinely not a lot of difference, anymore.
Let's talk sports betting. The sportsbooks aren't required to keep a bet open for any certain amount of time. Most popular bets like the moneyline (which team wins outright), or a points spread are open until a first pitch/tipoff/kickoff. If there's a major change in something (a star player is announced inactive before the game starts), the bet might close temporarily while they adjust odds. And even those odds adjust during the game. When it comes to the live betting for quick props like, "Will the Chargers score a field goal on their next drive?", most of those bets close with a reasonable amount of time before the event takes place. It's not like you're going to see Justin Herbert walking onto the field and that pop-up happens. You'd likely be offered that bet while the other offense is still on the field. With the potential of delay of what you're seeing on screen vs. where the game is in real time, for the instances I've placed live bets (example, NBA games), I've become accustomed to knowing that there's going to be a certain time I'd have to jump in on a bet, or it will disappear. Even in a streaming environment where I might be a couple of seconds behind what Vegas is seeing. But I adjust, and so will consumers/providers. Even if/when in-game betting options are commonly available on your television screen.
I don't understand why the belief is that NFLST will cost more through another provider.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

B. Shoe said:


> They're already doing NFLST through streaming. It's not "going to a streaming thing", because it's already here. Your NFLST subscription through DIRECTV allows you to access the app, which is also a DIRECTV product. We keep talking about "if it goes to streaming", but it's already been happening, *and is a pretty solid product in its current format. Even better than watching via satellite, in some regards.*


Agree with that. I have no streaming problem with multiple games on the screen at one time with my Spectrum 200 internet. Quality is excellent.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

B. Shoe said:


> It's not "going to a streaming thing", because it's already here.


In the event that it becomes a uniquely streaming offering, that would logically equate to "going to a streaming thing".


B. Shoe said:


> I don't understand why the belief is that NFLST will cost more through another provider.


If you're forced into an additional subscription (i.e. Amazon Prime, ESPN+, Apple TV+) to qualify for _access_ to NFLST, that may represent a net cost bump. I don't think anyone has suggested that the package price is expected to increase. I reason that having inroads to a much larger customer base would allow the price to drop significantly as the access increases in a big way.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

B. Shoe said:


> The NFLST live stream is nowhere near 90 seconds behind, or even 60 seconds. At most, it's about ten seconds. Everyone is watching on some sort of delay. I still got fantasy alerts ahead of plays back when I was subscribed to DIRECTV. There's genuinely not a lot of difference, anymore.


Interesting. When you say their live stream is ~10 seconds "behind," I guess you mean behind the DTV satellite feed? Which is plausible because satellite TV is several seconds behind traditional cable and OTA TV.

I measured the lag for local channels on YouTube TV recently at both my parents' home and then at mine (different cities, both homes on AT&T Fiber) and found in both cases a delay of 35 to 40 seconds versus the same channel via OTA antenna. I actually expected it to be closer to a full minute.


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## B. Shoe (Apr 3, 2008)

harsh said:


> In the event that it becomes a uniquely streaming offering, that would logically equate to "going to a streaming thing".


That's fair. I read these instances as that people don't know that a streaming version of NFLST is in operation.



harsh said:


> If you're forced into an additional subscription (i.e. Amazon Prime, ESPN+, Apple TV+) to qualify for _access_ to NFLST, that may represent a net cost bump. I don't think anyone has suggested that the package price is expected to increase. I reason that having inroads to a much larger customer base would allow the price to drop significantly as the access increases in a big way.


Also fair. I would agree that the price would drop if it becomes widely available through multiple providers. I assume that some people (many, who call to get a reduced cost/free NFLST for the season), fear they don't have that access to discounts in a world where NFLST is widely distributed, and discounts might not be available with other providers.



NashGuy said:


> Interesting. When you say their live stream is ~10 seconds "behind," I guess you mean behind the DTV satellite feed? Which is plausible because satellite TV is several seconds behind traditional cable and OTA TV.
> 
> I measured the lag for local channels on YouTube TV recently at both my parents' home and then at mine (different cities, both homes on AT&T Fiber) and found in both cases a delay of 35 to 40 seconds versus the same channel via OTA antenna. I actually expected it to be closer to a full minute.


That's a safe assumption in the first graph, albeit I haven't been subbed to DIRECTV for over three years now so I'm running on dated memory. For the instances that I'll have the Sunday Ticket streaming app running on either my iPad or television, and YTTV streaming on the other device, the NFLST app will be roughly 5 seconds ahead of YTTV. I simply haven't had an opportunity to do a side-by-side comparison against an OTA feed, but I've been around broadcast television enough to know you're correct on the gap.


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## inkahauts (Nov 13, 2006)

There is no other service that offers what I get from DIRECTV today. So I’m not going anywhere. If one ever comes up I’ll consider it. But I have never stuck with DIRECTV because of ST in the first place.


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## bjlc (Aug 20, 2004)

i spoke to my kid in Madison this past weekend.. she has cable and I have D*.. she was over a whole play behind me watching the Packer game.. and the packers scored.. while she was wondering what I was screaming about.. since the play had not yet happend yet..


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

B. Shoe said:


> I assume that some people (many, who call to get a reduced cost/free NFLST for the season), fear they don't have that access to discounts in a world where NFLST is widely distributed, and discounts might not be available with other providers.


I believe you are right. I also believe that fear is valid. It doesn't cost DIRECTV any more than the loss of income to give a discount on Sunday Ticket. They are paying the NFL a flat rate ... they don't have to pay the NFL per subscriber plus lose the income for that subscriber. Plus the NFL is more likely to set limits to prevent one provider from undercutting another ... keeping a level playing field. I'd expect any discounts to be provider agnostic.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

James Long said:


> I believe you are right. I also believe that fear is valid. It doesn't cost DIRECTV any more than the loss of income to give a discount on Sunday Ticket. They are paying the NFL a flat rate ... they don't have to pay the NFL per subscriber plus lose the income for that subscriber. Plus the NFL is more likely to set limits to prevent one provider from undercutting another ... keeping a level playing field. I'd expect any discounts to be provider agnostic.


Yea I am very scared of streaming stuff . Price and reliability. 

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

Agree streaming delay is more around 40-50seconds 

Usually I see on RZC first .. then local channel via D* (7-10 sec delay) ... then streaming about 40-50 seconds later 

Yes multiple tvs/screens in same room 

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

So testing tonight's college football game 

There's about a 10 second delay between the D* feed on 206 and the espn app.. the app being behind ...

There's a capitals NHL game on NBC SN Washington. Compared live D* feed and NBC SN app ... huge delay.. (this is probably where I got the 90 seconds from ...) 

There's a Jazz game on ch 752 . I compared that to NBA LP app and got about a 40 second delay.

Do you want any other comparisons? 

But issue could be my ISP since its buffering .. as I always say not everyone has reliable broadband 

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

dtv757 said:


> Yea I am very scared of streaming stuff.


As of two months ago, Disney Plus had 118 million subscribers (worldwide) and NetFlix had 214 million subscribers (worldwide). They can't all be suffering.


> Price and reliability.


Not having to subscribe to a conventional MPVD may be a big win cost-wise. DIRECTV is pretty high up there in the ARPU numbers relative to all other providers and that's just to have access to NFLST.

In your oft-repeated bad situation that's certainly a valid concern but it doesn't appear to be the case for a large percentage of the viewing population.


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## B. Shoe (Apr 3, 2008)

James Long said:


> I believe you are right. I also believe that fear is valid. It doesn't cost DIRECTV any more than the loss of income to give a discount on Sunday Ticket. They are paying the NFL a flat rate ... they don't have to pay the NFL per subscriber plus lose the income for that subscriber. Plus the NFL is more likely to set limits to prevent one provider from undercutting another ... keeping a level playing field. I'd expect any discounts to be provider agnostic.


And that is the underlying, and understandable, concern for many. There are a lot of people that have been receiving NFLST for several years that never pay full retail (or maybe anything at all) for the product. Making it widely distributed, or exclusive through another provider, likely eliminates that some of that possibility. What's their breaking point on price to where the product is out of their range? I've only paid full price for NFLST one season, but always tucked away a few bucks here and there, to be able to pay the full retail if a discount wasn't available. But there are people much smarter than me that will figure all of that pricing out.

Back to streaming vs. cable/satellite delays, we could go in circles for days on what delays one viewer sees versus another. For those that are experiencing lengthy delays on streaming, I'll take your word that you are seeing those, if you'll take my word that I'm not seeing them in that length. In the end, it boils down to whether that negatively impacts your viewing experience. In our home, we haven't experienced anything in that regard that is a deal breaker.

The greater circleback that I was hoping to accomplish by mentioning delays, was the side discussion that streaming delays could affect (what all signs point to being a thing) of in-game betting notices on your television screen. But as with re-pricing NFLST in a new platform/widely distributed means, there are a lot of really smart people who are probably tasked with figuring out such things to make sure they can maximize their potential in all arenas. Vegas casinos have a lot of pretty chandeliers and fancy fountains for a reason.

Good discussion, everyone. I enjoy it.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

The house always wins.
Or so it is said.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

B. Shoe said:


> There are a lot of people that have been receiving NFLST for several years that never pay full retail (or maybe anything at all) for the product.


Is this fair to those that pay full price?

How much discount should a few phone calls to badger customer service be worth? I'm betting it doesn't come anywhere near the $300 level.

I think it more likely that NFLST will be offered to most direct via streaming. If you're a customer of the company that produces and distributes the product, you may get a break but you know they'll make it up somewhere. DIRECTV's makeup came in the form of a >$190 ARPU and some generous portion of $6 billion in debt.

The true ugliness is likely to come from not being able to pause, fast forward or rewind the content (at least on game day).


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## B. Shoe (Apr 3, 2008)

harsh said:


> Is this fair to those that pay full price?
> 
> How much discount should a few phone calls to badger customer service be worth? I'm betting it doesn't come anywhere near the $300 level.
> 
> ...


It's fair in the sense that any DIRECTV customer is able to call and attempt to barter a discount for NFLST (or other discounts on their service during the billing period that NFLST is charged to help balance out the bill.)

I couldn't say how much discount calls should be worth. Based on years of monitoring this board, most successful discount calls are apparently worth anywhere between 20%-50% off the cost of NFLST (or for some fortunate ones, a free year.) To some, that's not even worth it. In my own personal experiences/circles, I have two friends who don't care to even attempt to call about their NFLST subscription, because they simply dislike calling customer service departments. They pay full price, annually.

I don't know if it's fair to assume that any NFLST streaming product in the future wouldn't be able to do some basic tasks like pause, fast forward, or rewind live content.


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## SamC (Jan 20, 2003)

“There is no such thing as fair” - John Dutton.

IMHO, at least 95% of the “poor customer service” gripes about AT&T have nothing to do with actual customer service, since the product rarely needs any service. Rather they are people that called wanting not to pay the rack rate for something and were told no.

In any event, times change. Expecting the Amazon or Apple or whoever ends up as the one and only exclusive provider of ST to discount like DirecTV misunderstands the nature of the business. If you believe there will be more than one source, then certainly there will be no discounts.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

SamC said:


> IMHO, at least 95% of the “poor customer service” gripes about AT&T have nothing to do with actual customer service, since the product rarely needs any service. Rather they are people that called wanting not to pay the rack rate for something and were told no.


Based on my observations, the gripes are often about the accounting system and widely varying answers from customer service about why things are the way they are. Those gripes aren't the subscriber's fault. DIRECTV needs to step up (or just step away from AT*T) and fix both their account system and bulk up their support scripts.

There are surely others who are bitter about not getting some freebie or discount that someone else did but the best way to fix that is to stop showing favoritism.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

SamC said:


> “There is no such thing as fair” - John Dutton.
> 
> IMHO, at least 95% of the “poor customer service” gripes about AT&T have nothing to do with actual customer service, since the product rarely needs any service. Rather they are people that called wanting not to pay the rack rate for something and were told no.
> 
> In any event, times change. Expecting the Amazon or Apple or whoever ends up as the one and only exclusive provider of ST to discount like DirecTV misunderstands the nature of the business. If you believe there will be more than one source, then certainly there will be no discounts.


I think you have that backwards. About 5% of the complaints are about not getting discounts and 95% are about the the absolute horrid customer service related to all other matters, ie....installation, repair, replacement and return services. They are close to the worst I've ever encountered.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

B. Shoe said:


> It's fair in the sense that any DIRECTV customer is able to call and attempt to barter a discount for NFLST (or other discounts on their service during the billing period that NFLST is charged to help balance out the bill.)


Unfortunately after saying yes for so many years the company has to calculate the cost of saying no. Is it worth losing this customer who is on the phone asking now? What does the algorithm say?

NFL ST this year is easy ... AT&T has agreed to cover all of the losses up to $1.5 billion on DIRECTV's distribution. But DIRECTV continues to offer other hefty discounts that are much more than the cost of NFL ST ... $55/$60 per month off for some people. Those kind of discounts can continue as long as DIRECTV remains in business.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

SamC said:


> In any event, times change. Expecting the Amazon or Apple or whoever ends up as the one and only exclusive provider of ST to discount like DirecTV misunderstands the nature of the business. If you believe there will be more than one source, then certainly there will be no discounts.


For any "exclusive" provider after 2022 I expect there will be a set price as an add on to whatever service that provider offers. In my opinion there is a small chance that it would be included in the regular price (to boost the value of the provider's base offer) but I don't see any exclusive provider giving an add on version for free or season long discount.

I agree that if there is more than one provider there will be no discounts by the provider on NFL ST. Only provider agnostic discounts (if any) from the NFL (early sign up, half season, etc.)


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## Steveknj (Nov 14, 2006)

James Long said:


> For any "exclusive" provider after 2022 I expect there will be a set price as an add on to whatever service that provider offers. In my opinion there is a small chance that it would be included in the regular price (to boost the value of the provider's base offer) but I don't see any exclusive provider giving an add on version for free or season long discount.
> 
> I agree that if there is more than one provider there will be no discounts by the provider on NFL ST. Only provider agnostic discounts (if any) from the NFL (early sign up, half season, etc.)


Sorry I'm late to the party here, but I wonder about the last statement. We frequently see discounts and freebies for other "pay services" like HBO as incentives to sign up or stay. If NFLST is offered on multiple platforms and one is giving you a discount and another isn't, that's an incentive go join that provider. So why would providers shy away from offering a discount, unless the NFL says it's verboten? They didn't with DirecTV, obviously.


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## raott (Nov 23, 2005)

harsh said:


> Is this fair to those that pay full price?
> 
> How much discount should a few phone calls to badger customer service be worth? I'm betting it doesn't come anywhere near the $300 level.
> 
> ...


What does "fair" have to do with it? It's an arms length business transaction. Do you pay sticker for cars?


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Steveknj said:


> Sorry I'm late to the party here, but I wonder about the last statement. We frequently see discounts and freebies for other "pay services" like HBO as incentives to sign up or stay. If NFLST is offered on multiple platforms and one is giving you a discount and another isn't, that's an incentive go join that provider. So why would providers shy away from offering a discount, unless the NFL says it's verboten? They didn't with DirecTV, obviously.


The discounts on HBO and other premiums are small - currently $54 per month for 3 months. I assume these are made with the approval of the premium channels and they are hoping that you'll get hooked and keep subscribing to their service. Such discounts have been offered by multiple carriers for decades.

The NFL was happy to take their money and run ... they are getting $1.5 billion per year for NFL ST whether DIRECTV makes a profit or not. Although the dollar figure has gone up, this is also an arrangement that has gone on for decades.

Do you see "free NBA" or "free NHL" or "free MLB" offers (other than offers not specific to one carrier)?

As an exclusive to Amazon or some other streamer I can see the NFL doing a "take the money and run" deal. As long as the streamer stays in business long enough to pay the $3 billion per year (or whatever the deal becomes) who cares if it is profitable for the streamer? Who cares how many people can watch? The NFL gets paid the same.

But structured like the NBA/NHL/MLB packages I expect the prices and free periods to be set by the NFL. All carriers treated equally. The service marketed in a way that would bring in the highest number of paying subscribers.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

James Long said:


> For any "exclusive" provider after 2022 I expect there will be a set price as an add on to whatever service that provider offers. In my opinion there is a small chance that it would be included in the regular price (to boost the value of the provider's base offer) but I don't see any exclusive provider giving an add on version for free or season long discount.


If Apple lands NFLST, I imagine that they'd just throw in a year of "free" Apple TV+ (which regularly costs only $50) when you purchase the season-long NFLST package. (Not sure how they'd handle folks who had already prepaid for a year of Apple TV+ and then wanted NFLST -- probably just extend their Apple TV+ subscription.) Perhaps a new "NFL" tab would pop up inside the Apple TV app. Otherwise, they'd just showcase those live games at the top of the existing Sports tab.

If Amazon lands NFLST, it's probably only sold to those who already have an active annual Prime membership, or who purchase one at the same time as they purchase NFLST. (Although I suppose it's possible that they also sell it like any of the existing Amazon Channels add-ons, which can be added to a monthly Prime Video-only subscription.) I expect the games would just stream in the Prime Video app alongside all their other video offerings.

I do think it's reasonable that either Apple or Amazon would sell season-long subscriptions for less than the standard retail price we've seen so far, i.e. $400, although I don't see either just giving the service away as a freebie with their base video service. Too costly. That really makes no sense for Apple, given that Apple TV+ is only a $5/mo service. As for giving it away as part of a Prime membership, at this point, I don't think it would result in _that_ many incremental Prime sign-ups given how many US households already have it. So I don't think it would make financial sense for Amazon to spend billions on the package and then just give it away to offer one more reason to take/keep Prime.

Only other exclusive deal I can see happening is Disney/ESPN. If they got it, I imagine that NFLST would be priced to include an annual subscription to either ESPN+ (reg. $70/yr) or to the full Disney bundle (reg. $14/mo, so $168 for a year). For instance, maybe they'd price the package at $349 and that would get you the full season of NFLST plus a full year of Disney+, Hulu (base w/ ads), and ESPN+. However they do it, the NFLST games would stream inside the ESPN app. 

Whoever gets it, it would be nice if the games streamed in 4K HDR but I'd say that's doubtful given that they'll probably just be passing through the feeds they get from CBS (1080i, streaming at 1080p) and Fox (720p), right?


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

If they do go exclusively to streaming, I cannot imagine the experience will be the same as it is on DirecTV. My setup has 5 TV's and 3 DVR's, plus an AppleTV. On the AppleTV, I go quad screen, so I have 4 games on, plus watching games on the other TV's. Will streaming allow for that many simultaneous streams ? So, it's not just the issue of DirecTV (potentially) losing Sunday Ticket, it is how it will be implemented on a streaming service. DirecTV is far from perfect; the equipment is older than dirt, and the price is too high. But, for me, I have not found anything better. I hope they keep it as a non-exclusive. But if they don't. I'll do the streaming option and roll with it. 

I just don't see how a streaming option would be a better (or even the same) experience for me or others.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

glrush said:


> So, it's not just the issue of DirecTV (potentially) losing Sunday Ticket, it is how it will be implemented on a streaming service.


There's nothing "potential" about it. The 2022-23 season will be DIRECTV's last.

How many streams you get and features are going to depend on what the bid winner decides they want to offer. Depending on how it is marketed (whether direct or through third parties), what you get may be a subset of that offering.

Surely the NFL will come into the negotiations with a wish list of features but it really comes down to the bids they get as the NFL producing the product themselves is pretty clearly off the table.

Starnote: The NFLST trademark specifically applies to satellite so that may be interesting to watch.


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

harsh said:


> There's nothing "potential" about it. The 2022-23 season will be DIRECTV's last.
> 
> How many streams you get and features are going to depend on what the bid winner decides they want to offer. Depending on how it is marketed (whether direct or through third parties), what you get may be a subset of that offering.
> 
> Surely the NFL will come into the negotiations with a wish list of features but it really comes down to the bids they get as the NFL producing the product themselves is pretty clearly off the table.


So, you are stating, FOR A FACT, that " The 2022-23 season will be DIRECTV's last". 

So, you are saying, that DirecTV will not carry Sunday Ticket, in any form past next season. Not for commercial properties, not for residential, not as an exclusive or non-exclusive. Nothing. 

Gotcha.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

glrush said:


> If they do go exclusively to streaming, I cannot imagine the experience will be the same as it is on DirecTV. My setup has 5 TV's and 3 DVR's, plus an AppleTV. On the AppleTV, I go quad screen, so I have 4 games on, plus watching games on the other TV's. Will streaming allow for that many simultaneous streams ?


Sure. A high-quality 1080p stream of live sports encoded in H.264 (i.e. what you get on DirecTV Stream) is about 8-9 Mbps. So multiply that by the number of screens you're watching on. Wanna watch on 5 TVs at once? You should be OK if you've got internet service with a download speed of at least 60 Mbps with a decent router.

As for watching four games on the same screen (i.e. multiview), it's quite possible in that scenario that the video server ramps down the resolution for each game since each one is only taking up a quarter of the screen. No need to send four 1080p streams for that single screen. Could instead send four 270p streams and keep the same total bitrate for what's sent to that screen. (Or more realistically, the lowest resolution on the server's bitrate ladder would probably be widescreen SD 480p, so each of the four quadrants of the multiview would be streamed at that resolution with the streaming device combining and rescaling to output a single 1080p or 2160p stream via HDMI to the TV.)

Will have to see how a streaming NFLST would handle replays. Given the expected cost, surely the provider will offer on-demand replays for all the games at least for one week, if not for the full season.


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

NashGuy said:


> Sure. A high-quality 1080p stream of live sports encoded in H.264 (i.e. what you get on DirecTV Stream) is about 8-9 Mbps. So multiply that by the number of screens you're watching on. Wanna watch on 5 TVs at once? You should be OK if you've got internet service with a download speed of at least 60 Mbps with a decent router.
> 
> As for watching four games on the same screen (i.e. multiview), it's quite possible in that scenario that the video server ramps down the resolution for each game since each one is only taking up a quarter of the screen. No need to send four 1080p streams for that single screen. Could instead send four 270p streams and keep the same total bitrate for what's sent to that screen. (Or more realistically, the lowest resolution on the server's bitrate ladder would probably be widescreen SD 480p, so each of the four quadrants of the multiview would be streamed at that resolution with the streaming device combining and rescaling to output a single 1080p or 2160p stream via HDMI to the TV.)
> 
> Will have to see how a streaming NFLST would handle replays. Given the expected cost, surely the provider will offer on-demand replays for all the games at least for one week, if not for the full season.


I am not concerned with the bandwidth requirements, at least in my case. I have fiber to the home and an excellent mesh router setup. 
What concerns me is if there will be a limit on number of concurrent streams ala Netflix, Prime etc. If they say, for example, you can only have 3 concurrent streams/account, that would not be as flexible as what is currently available on DirecTV. 
The NFL Commish may have some update on negotiations during Super Bowl week.


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## B. Shoe (Apr 3, 2008)

glrush said:


> If they do go exclusively to streaming, I cannot imagine the experience will be the same as it is on DirecTV. My setup has 5 TV's and 3 DVR's, plus an AppleTV. On the AppleTV, I go quad screen, so I have 4 games on, plus watching games on the other TV's. Will streaming allow for that many simultaneous streams ? So, it's not just the issue of DirecTV (potentially) losing Sunday Ticket, it is how it will be implemented on a streaming service. DirecTV is far from perfect; the equipment is older than dirt, and the price is too high. But, for me, I have not found anything better. I hope they keep it as a non-exclusive. But if they don't. I'll do the streaming option and roll with it.
> 
> I just don't see how a streaming option would be a better (or even the same) experience for me or others.


If I'm reading your post correctly, you have one room set up with multiple televisions and boxes? If that's correct, I'm envious. But your experience isn't necessarily based upon the fact of the provider, but the setup of multiple televisions set up in your room. We're a streaming-only, one television home here. Similar gear with an ATV4K and Sunday Ticket's streaming product. For me, it's a better version of the product. I select the games I want to watch in a quad-box view, and prop Red Zone in one of the four corners. If the local network game is worth watching, I'll place it to the side on my tablet on YouTube TV. But usually Red Zone can keep me up to date enough on that game, especially if it's the late window. But my attention is never bouncing around from game to game as much as I like to think it is during a regular NFL Sunday.

In short, I think for most, the features of the streaming product for those with modest setups would be a surprisingly welcome experience. But we can agree to disagree. I do agree with you on the lack of available concurrent streams, in its current format. Under any new provider, the immediate hope is that number is increased.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

glrush said:


> What concerns me is if there will be a limit on number of concurrent streams ala Netflix, Prime etc. If they say, for example, you can only have 3 concurrent streams/account, that would not be as flexible as what is currently available on DirecTV.


Ah, I see. IMO, they way they should do it is like DTV Stream does it: allow a large number of simultaneous streams on your home wifi network (for those viewers who want to watch a different game on every TV in their house), plus maybe a couple additional simultaneous streams outside of that network (which might be restricted to just mobile devices).


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

NashGuy said:


> If Apple lands NFLST, I imagine that they'd just throw in a year of "free" Apple TV+ (which regularly costs only $50) when you purchase the season-long NFLST package.


Yeah that makes sense as a good come-on, give them the full year rather than have them sign up in September and drop it after December. Gives them a chance to perhaps get hooked on some of the shows, so when that freebie went away you'd stay subscribed year round.


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

B. Shoe said:


> If I'm reading your post correctly, you have one room set up with multiple televisions and boxes? If that's correct, I'm envious. But your experience isn't necessarily based upon the fact of the provider, but the setup of multiple televisions set up in your room. We're a streaming-only, one television home here. Similar gear with an ATV4K and Sunday Ticket's streaming product. For me, it's a better version of the product. I select the games I want to watch in a quad-box view, and prop Red Zone in one of the four corners. If the local network game is worth watching, I'll place it to the side on my tablet on YouTube TV. But usually Red Zone can keep me up to date enough on that game, especially if it's the late window. But my attention is never bouncing around from game to game as much as I like to think it is during a regular NFL Sunday.
> 
> In short, I think for most, the features of the streaming product for those with modest setups would be a surprisingly welcome experience. But we can agree to disagree. I do agree with you on the lack of available concurrent streams, in its current format. Under any new provider, the immediate hope is that number is increased.


We stream on our TV's too, and it works just fine for sitting down and watching a movie or binging a series. The issue for me is swapping quickly between games. I am a Dolphins fan, so leaving the Dolphins game on and not touching streaming works great. But, if you want quickly go from one game to another, streaming isn't as good for that as DirecTV (buffering, etc). Granted, this is a total "first world problem", and I'm sure I'll get used to it if I have to, but IMO, 100 % streaming would not be as good as an experience as it currently is with DirecTV.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

harsh said:


> There's nothing "potential" about it. The 2022-23 season will be DIRECTV's last.


The last as an exclusive? Sure - all signs point to the contract not being renewed. But the last time NFL ST will be on DIRECTV? Only if someone else buys an exclusive or DIRECTV otherwise decides not to participate. I expect a non-exclusive offering would be available on DIRECTV.



harsh said:


> Starnote: The NFLST trademark specifically applies to satellite so that may be interesting to watch.


Easily changed. Not sure why it would be interesting to watch. The trade marks are owned by the NFL and already are used with the streaming portion of the service.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

glrush said:


> I just don't see how a streaming option would be a better (or even the same) experience for me or others.


For your specific use case better could be difficult. Individual streams to different devices. I like the scheme NashGuy mentioned - multiple streams per house based on IP.

I believe a streamer could come up with a better interface for viewing the games on a single TV. Make your own multiple screen display, zoom in and out to make one game dominant, rewind any game individually. If one had limited bandwidth lower quality feeds could be used for the multiple screen display with high quality feeds when one game is larger or full screen.

While satellite is an excellent high bandwidth way of delivering hundreds of high quality feeds into millions of homes simultaneously, it requires equipment at the homes to manage rewind and other features and a satellite tuner for each desired channel. Use cases other than yours may find streaming to be more robust.

I expect full game replays will be available as soon as clearance allows (can't infringe on the broadcaster's rights).


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

glrush said:


> So, you are stating, FOR A FACT, that " The 2022-23 season will be DIRECTV's last".


I'm saying that the end of next season will represent the end of DIRECTV's stranglehold on the package.

Carriage through DIRECTV will be up to whomever wins the bidding war. Whether or not the successful bidder wants to chase after the 6% of the population that doesn't have broadband is their decision to make.

The way video distribution is trending, the chances seem pretty grim for DIRECTV reselling the product.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

James Long said:


> I expect a non-exclusive offering would be available on DIRECTV.


I fully expect that it will be an exclusive offering. I doubt the motivation to go through resellers is particularly compelling.


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

harsh said:


> I'm saying that the end of next season will represent the end of DIRECTV's stranglehold on the package.
> 
> Carriage through DIRECTV will be up to whomever wins the bidding war. Whether or not the successful bidder wants to chase after the 6% of the population that doesn't have broadband is their decision to make.
> 
> The way video distribution is trending, the chances seem pretty grim for DIRECTV reselling the product.


Here is what I know is true:
It will be on DirecTV or....
It won't be on DirecTV. 

Everything else is speculation.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

harsh said:


> I fully expect that it will be an exclusive offering. I doubt the motivation to go through resellers is particularly compelling.


Whatever brings in the most money for the NFL. If they can't get a multi-billion dollar sugar daddy deal they may change to the non-exclusive model used by the other major sports.

I also see the possibility of NFL ST going to a commercial only model with large businesses such as casinos paying billions to get people to come to their businesses and watch the games. A long shot that I would not bet on but I would not rule out any distribution model - including the NFL deciding not to offer ST if they can't get the billions they want.

The big money is coming from the already signed TV deals. NFL ST is just a extra income.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

James Long said:


> Whatever brings in the most money for the NFL.


What might that be in your mind?


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

See above.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

James Long said:


> I also see the possibility of NFL ST going to a commercial only model with large businesses such as casinos paying billions to get people to come to their businesses and watch the games. A long shot that I would not bet on but I would not rule out any distribution model - including the NFL deciding not to offer ST if they can't get the billions they want.
> 
> The big money is coming from the already signed TV deals. NFL ST is just a extra income.


Nah, no way the NFL leaves money on the table by not _somehow_ offering ST to residential subscribers. There are a few million households who want and will pay for it. It would stir up too much of a backlash from fans if they tried to restrict the package to only commercial establishments.

They're obviously hoping for an exclusive deal with a rich streamer (who might in turn choose to sub-license ST to DTV for commercial-only distribution). Failing that, it'll be a multi-distributor situation like MLB and NBA have, with the package available via a standalone streaming app as well as an add-on to any MVPD that wants to sell it. That latter scenario is the only way I see residential DTV customers being able to watch ST on their DTV receivers come 2023.

Hypothetical numbers have been kicked around here and elsewhere to analyze cost and revenue. I find it hard to believe that any exclusive distributor could recoup the $2.0-2.5 billion the NFL wants for such a deal (not to mention additional costs for marketing and operations). So I guess it would come down to whether Amazon, Apple or Disney/ESPN thinks the shortfall would be worth it as a price to pay to promote their larger business. Even if half the cost could be recouped through sales, I question whether it's worth losing over $1 billion per year on NFLST to buoy interest in Prime Video, Apple TV+ or ESPN+. How many Americans are _really_ that interested in watching out-of-market NFL games happening on Sunday afternoons when they have games to watch on Fox and CBS/Paramount+, most notably the one featuring their nearest team?

Amazon is spending $1 billion per year to be the exclusive source of Thursday Night Football, except for carriage on a local channel in each market whose local team is playing. That, to me, looks like a better way to burn $1 billion on NFL carriage rights than losing the same amount (probably more) to be the exclusive home of NFLST.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

NashGuy said:


> Nah, no way the NFL leaves money on the table by not _somehow_ offering ST to residential subscribers. There are a few million households who want and will pay for it. It would stir up too much of a backlash from fans if they tried to restrict the package to only commercial establishments.


What is more important, billions of dollars or happy fans? I am not saying a business only deal is likely - I am only saying that it us possible. If you don't see that possibly that is fine.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

James Long said:


> What is more important, billions of dollars or happy fans?


In the long run, the former depends on the latter (which is probably why the NFL is bound and determined that ST will be widely available via streaming going forward). Not saying happy fans are the _summum bonum_ for the NFL, but it's definitely a consideration.


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## B. Shoe (Apr 3, 2008)

NashGuy said:


> How many Americans are _really_ that interested in watching out-of-market NFL games happening on Sunday afternoons when they have games to watch on Fox and CBS/Paramount+, most notably the one featuring their nearest team?


This is the billion dollar question. For a lot of casual NFL viewers, they're interested in being able to check in on all of the games on a Sunday afternoon, and RedZone Channel allows them to do that. We've seen a lot of users on this board say, "I have NFLST, but I mainly stick to RedZone."

For many fans, NFLST is a nice thing to have, as long as they don't have to pay too much for it. It's a luxury, not a necessity, in terms of viewing. RedZone seems to suffice, or finding alternate rogue means to watch said NFL content. A good hierarchy of fans interested in Sunday Ticket likely includes the following. Is the below list enough to shell out $1.5-2B (based on current contract value with DIRECTV) for exclusive rights?

Out-of-market fans interested in being able to watch all of their team's games.
Diehard football fans who want access to any game, any time.
Those involved in sports betting (and this, inevitably, will trump number two on this list as more states legalize sports betting.)


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

James Long said:


> See above.


Do you really think that forcing those desiring out-of-market games into gaming parlors and taverns is reasonable from an eyeball perspective?

Casinos don't need a bunch of people who aren't actively gambling lounging about.


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## Steveknj (Nov 14, 2006)

James Long said:


> The discounts on HBO and other premiums are small - currently $54 per month for 3 months. I assume these are made with the approval of the premium channels and they are hoping that you'll get hooked and keep subscribing to their service. Such discounts have been offered by multiple carriers for decades.
> 
> The NFL was happy to take their money and run ... they are getting $1.5 billion per year for NFL ST whether DIRECTV makes a profit or not. Although the dollar figure has gone up, this is also an arrangement that has gone on for decades.
> 
> ...


When I signed up for DirecTV Stream, I got a year of NBA free (which I really had no use for, but I got it). That was many months ago (and I've sense left the service), so yeah, I've gotten that free. Years ago, I got NHL CI for free, after paying for it for a year and wanted to cancel and they gave it to me for free (with a 2 year commitment of course) on DirecTV. So yeah, it's been done before. And, of course I'm currently getting a year free of P+ and I had gotten a year free of Netflix from my mobile carrier, and heavily discounted Hulu ($1 a month currently). So I do think that while the NFL might curtail that possibility, I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that if one of the carriers want to discount NFL ST (and take the loss themselves), why the NFL would stand in their way. It wouldn't be costing them a dime.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

NashGuy said:


> ...
> 
> 
> How many Americans are _really_ that interested in watching out-of-market NFL games happening on Sunday afternoons when they have games to watch on Fox and CBS/Paramount+, most notably the one featuring their nearest team?
> ...


TLDR ... but not everyone is a fan of the local team . Plus with NFL its only 1 game a week. Unlike the other sports where they play multiple games in a week. 

Not everyone has good broadband for the streaming stuff but the streaming stuff would mirror the local channel /local teams (not counting VPN s and other manipulation) .

But major sports fans would sub to out of market packages.. 

Last year alone D* gave me : 
Free NFL ST 
Half off NBA LP
And Half off MLB EI 

No way a POS cable co would offer that unless someone worked there, which I dont work for D* just a long time loyal customer .. 

Plus now there is sports betting so I imaging the demand for sports packages slightly increased . 

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Steveknj said:


> So I do think that while the NFL might curtail that possibility, I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that if one of the carriers want to discount NFL ST (and take the loss themselves), why the NFL would stand in their way. It wouldn't be costing them a dime.


As long as the carrier takes 100% of the loss it opens the door for a discount that happens to be the price of NFL ST. Some programmers with premium content don't want to see their content given away for free even if the carrier takes the loss. A few years ago DISH gave all of their customers a variety of programming as an anniversary gift and got complaints from the programmer. They believed being given away for free cheapened their brand. A month or three as an introductory offer was OK ... but there was a limit.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

James Long said:


> As long as the carrier takes 100% of the loss it opens the door for a discount that happens to be the price of NFL ST. Some programmers with premium content don't want to see their content given away for free even if the carrier takes the loss. A few years ago DISH gave all of their customers a variety of programming as an anniversary gift and got complaints from the programmer. They believed being given away for free cheapened their brand. A month or three as an introductory offer was OK ... but there was a limit.


I remember getting a year of Cinemax from Dish for one cent several years ago, which was pretty nice. Not sure why they charged a penny. Maybe it was a violation of terms to give it away completely free for that long?


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## JoeTheDragon (Jul 21, 2008)

harsh said:


> Carriage through DIRECTV will be up to whomever wins the bidding war. Whether or not the successful bidder wants to chase after the 6% of the population that doesn't have broadband is their decision to make.
> 
> The way video distribution is trending, the chances seem pretty grim for DIRECTV reselling the product.


the bar market may not have the bandwith to steam 8-15+ feeds at the same time and they can't get other sports on that streaming system so there may be an $$$$$ Matrix Switch upgrade + steaming boxes and maybe HDCP issues with older Matrix Switchers.


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## JoeTheDragon (Jul 21, 2008)

NashGuy said:


> Amazon is spending $1 billion per year to be the exclusive source of Thursday Night Football, except for carriage on a local channel in each market whose local team is playing. That, to me, looks like a better way to burn $1 billion on NFL carriage rights than losing the same amount (probably more) to be the exclusive home of NFLST.


did they have any plans for commercial establishments? directv like how they do it for ESPN+?


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

JoeTheDragon said:


> did they have any plans for commercial establishments? directv like how they do it for ESPN+?


I have seen no plans for commercial distribution but others follow the issue more closely. It is interesting to note that the last nationally broadcast "Thursday Night Football" set a record for the offering ... but the game was played on a Saturday. And Fox was happy to get out of their contract.

NFL ST not in commercial establishments seems like an impossibility for some people. It would be interesting to see a number for how many commercial subscribers paid for the service in 2021 - and how many will pick it up this year.


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## Steveknj (Nov 14, 2006)

James Long said:


> The discounts on HBO and other premiums are small - currently $54 per month for 3 months. I assume these are made with the approval of the premium channels and they are hoping that you'll get hooked and keep subscribing to their service. Such discounts have been offered by multiple carriers for decades.
> 
> The NFL was happy to take their money and run ... they are getting $1.5 billion per year for NFL ST whether DIRECTV makes a profit or not. Although the dollar figure has gone up, this is also an arrangement that has gone on for decades.
> 
> ...


When I signed up for DirecTV Stream, I got a year of NBA free (which I really had no use for, but I got it). That was many months ago (and I've sense left the service), so yeah, I've gotten that free. Years ago, I got NHL CI for free, after paying for it for a year and wanted to cancel and they gave it to me for free (with a 2 year commitment of course) on DirecTV. So yeah, it's been done before. And, of course I'm currently getting a year free of P+ and I had gotten a year free of Netflix from my mobile carrier, and heavily discounted Hulu ($1 a month currently). So I do think that while the NFL might curtail that possibility, I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that if one of the carriers want to discount NFL ST (and take the loss themselves), why the NFL would stand in their way. It wouldn't be costing them a dime.


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## compnurd (Apr 23, 2007)

JoeTheDragon said:


> the bar market may not have the bandwith to steam 8-15+ feeds at the same time and they can't get other sports on that streaming system so there may be an $$$$$ Matrix Switch upgrade + steaming boxes and maybe HDCP issues with older Matrix Switchers.


Then bars are going to be watching whatever is on local


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## wmb (Dec 18, 2008)

NashGuy said:


> I do think it's reasonable that either Apple or Amazon would sell season-long subscriptions for less than the standard retail price we've seen so far, i.e. $400, although I don't see either just giving the service away as a freebie with their base video service. Too costly.


You’ve not watched football much, or forgotten Amazon’s primary business.

There are 20 or more commercial breaks, and over 100 advertising slots per game (50 minutes per game, How Much Football Is Even In A Football Broadcast? ) for about 150 games in the package, that’s about 15,000 slots to sell a year. If the get 500,000 viewers per game, that’s 7.5 billion targeted ads on their platform.

How much does a 30 second ad on a regular Sunday game cost now? $400k in 2019, how much more now? That’s for a national OTA broadcast slot. Using that price, ad revenue alone I could be $6 billion. They could maybe get more for targeted ads.









Price of NFL commercial time spiked this season: Here's how much ads cost


The spike in price coincided with an uptick in NFL ratings this season.




www.foxbusiness.com





If whoever gets Sunday Ticket can control all the ad slots in the games, they could give it away for free.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

wmb said:


> How much does a 30 second ad on a regular Sunday game cost now? $400k in 2019, how much more now?


How much of that money goes to DIRECTV? Advertisers are paying to be on the national and local broadcasts. DIRECTV is paying to rebroadcast the games to their customers.



wmb said:


> If whoever gets Sunday Ticket can control all the ad slots in the games, they could give it away for free.


If it was that big of a money maker DIRECTV wouldn't be looking to walk away. DIRECTV lost tens of millions of dollars on Sunday Ticket last year on a $1.5 billion investment and the NFL wants whomever gets an exclusive to pay more. To be profitable the carrier has to make more money than they pay the NFL.


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## forecheck (Jun 13, 2002)

wmb said:


> If whoever gets Sunday Ticket can control all the ad slots in the games, they could give it away for free.


Sunday Ticket has always included the national ads that Fox and CBS sell, I can't imagine that would change. There are a few minutes of local ads per game that could potentially be sold, but would depend on the contract. The NFL could also make it so that their promos or their PSA's run during that time. I only watch RedZone so not sure how DirecTv currently fills those slots.


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## mjwagner (Oct 8, 2005)

glrush said:


> If they do go exclusively to streaming, I cannot imagine the experience will be the same as it is on DirecTV. My setup has 5 TV's and 3 DVR's, plus an AppleTV. On the AppleTV, I go quad screen, so I have 4 games on, plus watching games on the other TV's. Will streaming allow for that many simultaneous streams ? So, it's not just the issue of DirecTV (potentially) losing Sunday Ticket, it is how it will be implemented on a streaming service. DirecTV is far from perfect; the equipment is older than dirt, and the price is too high. But, for me, I have not found anything better. I hope they keep it as a non-exclusive. But if they don't. I'll do the streaming option and roll with it.
> 
> I just don't see how a streaming option would be a better (or even the same) experience for me or others.


Just as a point of reference, back when PSVue was still in business they had implemented “multiview” on certain streaming devices (I used it on my ATV 4ks) that allowed you to have up to 4 panes each with a different channel on a single tv. You could move the focus around to any of the 4 panes and you would get the sound for that pane. It was really pretty slick and clearly showed that a OTT service could do it effectively, and that was back in 2019. Currently YTTV’s UI makes it pretty fast to switch between the last 4 channels you tuned to. Net is my guess is we will see lots of capability rolling out thru streaming services over the next several years. Personally one of the reasons I left D back in 2017/2018 was because I felt their technology was not really moving forward, at least in the areas I was interested in. But that is JMO.


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## mjwagner (Oct 8, 2005)

James Long said:


> I believe a streamer could come up with a better interface for viewing the games on a single TV. Make your own multiple screen display, zoom in and out to make one game dominant, rewind any game individually. If one had limited bandwidth lower quality feeds could be used for the multiple screen display with high quality feeds when one game is larger or full screen.


PSVue had already implemented most of that on certain streaming devices (I used it on my ATV 4KS) in “Multiview” back in 2019. It worked very well.


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## wmb (Dec 18, 2008)

James Long said:


> How much of that money goes to DIRECTV? Advertisers are paying to be on the national and local broadcasts. DIRECTV is paying to rebroadcast the games to their customers.
> 
> If it was that big of a money maker DIRECTV wouldn't be looking to walk away. DIRECTV lost tens of millions of dollars on Sunday Ticket last year on a $1.5 billion investment and the NFL wants whomever gets an exclusive to pay more. To be profitable the carrier has to make more money than they pay the NFL.


When the last deal was consummated, DirecTV had no way to put ads into the stream. Heck, they really don’t have that ability today.

No one looking to turn a profit from subscriptions alone would bid over $500 million per year… DirecTV’s had about 2 million subscribers at $300 per year each, total revenue would only have been $600 million. At that, no one with any sense would have paid over $300 million per year.

The only place where there is enough money to justify bidding on it is ad sales. That’s how the OTA networks justify it. They are selling $billions in ads a year.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

wmb said:


> When the last deal was consummated, DirecTV had no way to put ads into the stream. Heck, they really don’t have that ability today.


Cable and satellite systems (including DIRECTV) have had that technology for decades ... cable for decades before satellite. The location in programming is part of each channel's schedule. These are national ads inserted at the head end by the cable or satellite system.

In recent years (starting before the $1.5 billion renewal) DIRECTV has been able to do targeted advertising on their DVRs where each viewer could receive a different advertisement in those scheduled breaks.

Assuming DIRECTV could sell the "local" ad space normally used by local stations it is not enough space for DIRECTV to make billions of dollars off of in game advertising.



wmb said:


> The only place where there is enough money to justify bidding on it is ad sales.


DIRECTV made their money from commercial subscriptions. Subscriptions dropped over the past couple of years. A streamer might be optimistic enough to believe they could turn a profit. Especially a big one that is accustomed to dropping billions on content.


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## wmb (Dec 18, 2008)

James Long said:


> DIRECTV made their money from commercial subscriptions. Subscriptions dropped over the past couple of years. A streamer might be optimistic enough to believe they could turn a profit. Especially a big one that is accustomed to dropping billions on content.


I have a tough time seeing this, too. There are somewhere in the 100k to 200k table service restaurants in the US (I figure that’s the category for sports bars). I doubt there are 50k commercial accounts. To get to $500 million total revenue, they’d have to charge $10k per establishment. 

I don’t know, maybe you have better numbers. I just don’t see residential and commercial subscription revenue totaling over $1 billion, so I doubt someone selling subscriptions would would want to pay $500 million for that, especially since the reseller would take a cut, too.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Commercial rates are based on fire code occupancy. $13,700 for up to 750 people. $185k for over 10,000 people. I assume most businesses are smaller paying $6k for up to 200 people, $2,900 for up to 100 people and $1,600 for up to 50 people. (Early bird rates - prices can be higher.)

I am not sure how the combination of paid home subscribers and paid commercial subscribers adds up to $1.5 billion but the issue last year was that the total didn't reach $1.5 billion. DIRECTV lost money on NFL ST. The reported lose was "tens of millions of dollars" without detail as to how high the loss actually was. The numbers were not officially reported so there is no auditing one can point to and complain if they were inaccurately stated. Suffice it to say DIRECTV lost money and they lost enough money that part of the TPG purchase deal was that AT&T would cover the losses on NFL ST for the remainder of the exclusive contract (up to $2.5 billion over what then remained of the contract).

In any case, if DIRECTV can't make $1.5 billion to break even on NFL ST through whatever ways they monetize it it will be interesting to see how the next exclusive carrier of ST (if there is an exclusive carrier) manages to break even.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

wmb said:


> You’ve not watched football much, or forgotten Amazon’s primary business.
> 
> There are 20 or more commercial breaks, and over 100 advertising slots per game (50 minutes per game, How Much Football Is Even In A Football Broadcast? ) for about 150 games in the package, that’s about 15,000 slots to sell a year. If the get 500,000 viewers per game, that’s 7.5 billion targeted ads on their platform.
> 
> ...


Nope. Big flaw in your calculation is that you assume that the total number of viewers across NFLST would equal the total number of viewers nationwide for their local games in that time slot, meaning that it would fetch the same $400k per 30-second spot. Of course, out-of-market games collectively would fetch FAR fewer viewers than in-market games collectively and therefore the ad revenue would be far less than $400k per spot (or whatever it's risen to since 2019). Yes, per-impression (i.e. per-viewer) ad rates can be higher with targeted ads, which would presumably be used on a streaming NFLST service, but that's not going to make up for the huge difference in viewers for out-of-market vs. in-market games.


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## wmb (Dec 18, 2008)

NashGuy said:


> …Yes, per-impression (i.e. per-viewer) ad rates can be higher with targeted ads, which would presumably be used on a streaming NFLST service, but that's not going to make up for the huge difference in viewers for out-of-market vs. in-market games.


Ah, but the thing is, Amazon does targeted ads across platform, not just inserted into the video stream. As you browse the web, you start seeing ads for various things that target you based on watching Sunday Ticket. My assumption is that the value to the platform balanced the lower revenue from the in-game ad.


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## wmb (Dec 18, 2008)

James Long said:


> Commercial rates are based on fire code occupancy. $13,700 for up to 750 people. $185k for over 10,000 people. I assume most businesses are smaller paying $6k for up to 200 people, $2,900 for up to 100 people and $1,600 for up to 50 people. (Early bird rates - prices can be higher.)


One of the reasons often given for why bars wouldn’t change to streaming was the retrofit cost. If these are the rates for a season of Sunday Ticket, it’s hard to imagine e that the bar wouldn’t spend money to upgrade their equipment, especially since all other non-NFL Sunday Ticket sports are available via streaming.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

I have not priced out the retrofit costs. That is additional expensive equipment to handle a few more HDMI sources (one per game channel that the bar wants to use) in addition to the streaming receivers and paying qualified experts to get it working. If the bar is already using a streaming service and the receiver is compatible with whatever service ends up with NFL ST then they have a head start. If they are airing multiple games they will need to expand their system.

Having other sports "available" via streaming does not mean that the bars use streaming for all sports except NFL ST. As long as those sports are available via DIRECTV bars that have DIRECTV for ST might as well use the receivers already in place for ST to receive other sports. They would only need streaming for "stream only" games that DIRECTV did not carry. There is not a lot of sports DIRECTV does not carry.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

James Long said:


> Having other sports "available" via streaming does not mean that the bars use streaming for all sports except NFL ST.


Nobody said that they couldn't continue to use a conventional MVPD for the other content. It is somewhat less likely that the MVPD will be DIRECTV if they no longer offer NFLST.

Of course the difficulty comes in provisioning the displays for watching both MVPD and streaming content and gracefully switching between them. I expect the concept of head ends to reach into this space to provide that integration. I reason that conventional distribution systems probably aren't going to cut it in a world of 1080p and 4K.


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

wmb said:


> One of the reasons often given for why bars wouldn’t change to streaming was the retrofit cost. If these are the rates for a season of Sunday Ticket, it’s hard to imagine e that the bar wouldn’t spend money to upgrade their equipment, especially since all other non-NFL Sunday Ticket sports are available via streaming.



Even a simple 8 input matrix that supports dozens of TVs is far from cheap, and having that cost imposed on them by the NFL's search for even higher revenue wouldn't make them very happy.

Not only do you have to buy the switch, your coax to the individual receivers is useless - you need to run either cat6a or fiber HDMI cables to every TV to cover the distance. And you might need to replace everything if you saved money by buying a solution only good enough for HD and then NFLST does 4K someday. The wiring isn't cheap, neither the HDMI dongles on either end of each cat6a run or the long distance fiber HDMI cables - and I'd be concerned about the latter's durability in a commercial environment unless you have conduit.

You can pull and crush and bend and pinch and twist the heck out of RG6 and cat5/cat6 without any problems, so when an electrician is pulling a thick conduit for a new electrical run to your kitchen without regard for what is in the way and maybe stepping all over cables if it is in an attic those are fine but fiber maybe not so much. If you have a decent size place labor will be in the four figures for running the wiring to each TV as well unless you DIY.

The current system with Directv carrying NFLST works too well for commercial for anyone to toss it out. Even if a streamer like Amazon or Apple bought the exclusive Directv has now, it is hard to see why they wouldn't make a side deal with Directv to continue to allow them to offer NFLST. The streamer could wholesale it to Directv at the same price they charge their customers so they make the same money either way.

The satellite version would cost a bit more after Directv marked it up, but that would still save many places a lot of money not having to do all this extra stuff for 17 days a year. If you were going all streaming that's another matter, but that's not currently possible - there is no legal way to stream ESPN/ESPN2/ESPNU (and many other sports I'm sure but those are enough to invalidate the idea) in a public viewing environment.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

slice1900 said:


> The current system with Directv carrying NFLST works too well for commercial for anyone to toss it out.


Since DIRECTV will no longer be producing the product, the current model may not be suitable at all.

To make it flexible, I suspect that DIRECTV would have to put some serious effort into offering streaming through their receivers -- something they don't appear to have given much attention to.


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## JoeTheDragon (Jul 21, 2008)

wmb said:


> One of the reasons often given for why bars wouldn’t change to streaming was the retrofit cost. If these are the rates for a season of Sunday Ticket, it’s hard to imagine e that the bar wouldn’t spend money to upgrade their equipment, especially since all other non-NFL Sunday Ticket sports are available via streaming.





James Long said:


> I have not priced out the retrofit costs. That is additional expensive equipment to handle a few more HDMI sources (one per game channel that the bar wants to use) in addition to the streaming receivers and paying qualified experts to get it working. If the bar is already using a streaming service and the receiver is compatible with whatever service ends up with NFL ST then they have a head start. If they are airing multiple games they will need to expand their system.
> 
> Having other sports "available" via streaming does not mean that the bars use streaming for all sports except NFL ST. As long as those sports are available via DIRECTV bars that have DIRECTV for ST might as well use the receivers already in place for ST to receive other sports. They would only need streaming for "stream only" games that DIRECTV did not carry. There is not a lot of sports DIRECTV does not carry.


ESPN+ and other sports are available via streaming are on DIRECTV for places like bar's and it's on the sat beams.

also you need to make login's easy for bar's so NO 2FA / low max session times / long passwords that are hard to keyin with an remote.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

JoeTheDragon said:


> ESPN+ and other sports are available via streaming are on DIRECTV for places like bar's and it's on the sat beams.


Rates for ESPN+ via DIRECTV start at $143.74 per month for 50 patrons, $201.24 for 100 and keep climbing to $804.99 for places with over 350 estimated viewers.



JoeTheDragon said:


> also you need to make login's easy for bar's so NO 2FA / low max session times / long passwords that are hard to keyin with an remote.


A streaming login could be done on the receiver in the back room where the receiver feeds into the distribution system. I would expect the system would be more rugged than the residential user systems most are accustomed to using. No crackerjack box receivers or TV apps. Think outside of the residential experience.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

JoeTheDragon said:


> also you need to make login's easy for bar's so NO 2FA / low max session times / long passwords that are hard to keyin with an remote.


These days, most device logins are handled through a six charater OTP rather than account passwords or 2FA. The device app maintains that authentication for quite a while in my experience. For example, I can't remember the last time I logged my Roku or Fire Stick into Amazon Prime. It has even survived multiple Amazon account password changes.


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## inkahauts (Nov 13, 2006)

The more I’ve ponder all this the more I think it may end up being something like mlb extra innings. 

Espn buys the rights. It could be purchased not only through DIRECTV and dish and anyone else who wants to make space on their services for it but also as an add on to espn plus.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

inkahauts said:


> Espn buys the rights. It could be purchased not only through DIRECTV and dish and anyone else who wants to make space on their services for it but also as an add on to espn plus.


MLBEI has been around for a long time as a widely available linear cable product; the cow is open range.

In stark contrast, NFLST has always been a mostly single-source offering (with a complicated qualification process for the alternative). The cow remains substantially in the barn with respect to maintaining NFLST as a single source offering. That's surely a much easier model to manage for both the producer and the NFL.

The fact that NFLST is mostly a one day a week event makes even more sense as an independent offering.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Best case for the NFL is some deep pocket company offering billions of dollars. The NFL takes the money and moves on. Let the deep pocket company figure out how to profit on their deal (as long as what they do does not infringe on other NFL deals).

Second best would be a scheme like the other leagues have where multiple MVPDs carry the service. This is second best since the NFL would need subscribers to pay for the service. The current exclusive deal does not require any subscribers - all it requires is a company willing to pay billions for carriage.

An exclusive contract for $2-3 billion would serve the NFL well. They would need to protect their broadcast partners who are shelling out a lot more money for carriage. Would Sunday game replays/recaps be limited to Mon-Wed to give Amazon the privilege of being the only NFL game that could be viewed on Thursday? How long after the Sunday games would a replay be available before it goes in the NFL vault?

If an exclusive contract is sold there will be a question of whether or not the contract holder needs to resell the coverage to break even and whether or not the NFL will allow the contract holder to resell the coverage. DIRECTV was blocked from putting NFL ST on their UVERSE and OTT services - there is no guarantee that the NFL will allow the next exclusive carrier to distribute the games however they see fit. There are always limits.

Best case for the consumer doesn't have a role here ... the NFL has the choice and they will make the choice that is in THEIR best intrerest. More money less viewers isn't a problem. More money no commercial customers isn't a problem. More money and only Mark Cuban and his friends can watch out of market games isn't a problem. Just give the NFL more money and I expect they will take the deal.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

The best for consumers is that which offers attainable and reliable service at a reasonable price. What's best for commercial subscribers may or may not be different.

The best for the NFL is one that involves only bank wire transfers. What's best for the consumers may or may not be a overarching concern for the NFL as long as they get their wire transfers.

Noodling in general terms about how bidders might get there seems pointless. Narrowing the field of likely winners involves addressing each bidder individually and consideration of their exiting business model.

What the participating carriers must do is entirely their problem. The more complex the configuration, the less likely that the service is going to meet the reliability criteria.

From my point of view, Amazon and Apple have a closed-loop model with a very broad reach. ESPN has a hybrid model that could go either way. Given the ongoing decline of the MVPD model's reach, it may make more sense to concentrate on the streaming model since they wouldn't have to honor any existing MVPD contracts (something HBO had to do but seems to be trying to close the door on).


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

harsh said:


> MLBEI has been around for a long time as a widely available linear cable product; the cow is open range.
> 
> In stark contrast, NFLST has always been a mostly single-source offering (with a complicated qualification process for the alternative).



That's because there has always been one company willing to pay enough to make that happen. MLBEI might have ended up the same if Directv had been interested enough in an exclusive to write a big enough check.

With a sample size of one, it is impossible to make any claims about what the NFL will end up with based on what they ended up with in the past.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

harsh said:


> Given the ongoing decline of the MVPD model's reach, it may make more sense to concentrate on the streaming model since they wouldn't have to honor any existing MVPD contracts (something HBO had to do but seems to be trying to close the door on).


Terms not disclosed, but HBO either needed to renew their contracts with a clause that allowed "direct to consumer" distribution or rely on contracts that did not prohibit direct to consumer. My assumption is that they relied on the latter until each MVPD contract expired and then allowed MVPDs to renew with the option of offering HBO Max as part of the linear channel subscription. Customers could subscribe direct to HBO Max and get all the content via streaming or via participating MVPDs who would provide linear channels via the MVPD service and access to HBO Max via streaming. (I assume some small cable systems are still delivering just HBO without reselling HBO Max - their customers still have the option to subscribe direct to HBO Max and get just streaming.)

DISH balked at the minimum subscriber count HBO required. After a sufficient cooling off period they now offer HBO Max with some MVPD distributed channels and some integrated content. The full HBO Max offerings included but requiring a separate app or web access. Terms not disclosed but the channels and content would not be there if both sides had not agreed to amicable terms.

I am surprised that the NFL didn't do their own streaming or pick a streaming partner sooner. Perhaps their terms not disclosed deal with DIRECTV prevented having a vMVPD partner. The deal prevented AT&T|DIRECTV from becoming a vMVPD partner without extra money. If I recall correctly the NFL had an exclusive streaming deal with Verizon Wireless where people could watch the NFL on their cell phones as part of their Verizon Wireless service. The exclusive deal expired and that opened the door to streaming to non Verizon Wireless customers. That was the point where I expected the NFL to be able to add a vMVPD partner but I expect some "terms not disclosed" agreement with DIRECTV got in the way.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

FWIW, with regard to the question of sports bars possibly being forced to stream NFLST, the recent piece published by the NY Post about Apple aggressively pursuing a deal indicates that bars probably won't face that scenario. The article itself is paywalled but another article quotes the author, Marchand:

_Marchand believes the bar business "will be a separate deal," while the satellite setup "will likely continue."_

Not clear to me if the latter part of that sentence means that Marchand is saying DTV satellite is likely to continue offering NFLST to all customers or if he's linking that to the first part of the sentence to mean that DTV satellite would continue to carry it only for commercial establishments.

While I don't think it's implausible that NFLST become a purely streaming-only product, it's not the likeliest scenario for reasons already expounded in recent posts by others. Most likely scenario is that sports bar at least have the option of buying the package via the DTV satellite TV system that they already have installed.

Would DTV pay what it would take to be able to offer NFLST to all their satellite TV customers, e.g. to be the exclusive non-streaming distributor while Apple/Amazon/ESPN+ is the exclusive streaming distributor? Hard to see such a deal happening but I guess it's not out of the question. Would such a deal make sense for DTV satellite given its current position? Would Apple/Amazon/ESPN+ want consumers to have another option for buying the package? Although who would opt to get it via satellite TV over streaming except those without broadband or who were already on DTV sat service anyhow?

It's interesting that DTV will be the presenting sponsor for The Chairman's Party this coming Super Bowl week. Why splash that sort of cash at the NFL if they're not trying to keep a foot in the door for NFLST?



https://www.nexttv.com/news/directv-to-host-party-super-bowl-week-featuring-usher


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

I note that "ESPN+ for Business" via DIRECTV is a "for business" offering. Residential subscribers cannot get ESPN+ via DIRECTV's satellites (even though the content is obviously there for businesses).

I can see "NFL ST for Business" being offered as long as it is profitable for DIRECTV and whomever gets an exclusive contract (if an exclusive deal is cut). With the same restrictions as ESPN+ ... no residential subscribers. ESPN has the business relationship in place so perhaps "NFL ST for Business" is more likely if ESPN wins the exclusive war.

As noted all the speculation is based on who ends up with the content and if it is an exclusive if that company believes they need partners to assist in distributing the content. It would be a lot easier to offer "NFL ST for Business" via existing DIRECTV equipment than ask subscribing businesses to install streaming receivers. It would also be easy to not support non-residential distribution. It is all up to the company that gets the exclusive (if any company gets an exclusive).


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

slice1900 said:


> With a sample size of one, it is impossible to make any claims about what the NFL will end up with based on what they ended up with in the past.


Not only is it possible, it might even be predictable. Do you suppose that Netflix, Hulu or Amazon has any intention of opening up their offering the MVPDs?


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

What channel numbers are the espn + for biz ? 

I think 9000 something is the ufc ppv for biz 

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

James Long said:


> I am surprised that the NFL didn't do their own streaming or pick a streaming partner sooner.


With just months to prepare, I'm not sure how anyone is going to pull it off and make it a unified package that insures a comparable offering across all the platforms.

I place a great deal of importance on the idea that DIRECTV producing the NFLST product (by assembling licensed content from multiple sources) was critical to the success of the package. NFLST isn't just a glorified LiL lookalike.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

James Long said:


> I can see "NFL ST for Business" being offered as long as it is profitable for DIRECTV and whomever gets an exclusive contract (if an exclusive deal is cut).


Currently, a DIRECTV subscription is more or less physically required. Given a widely available alternative in the form of broadband, would there be sufficient market left to bother with it?


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## lparsons21 (Mar 4, 2006)

harsh said:


> With just months to prepare, I'm not sure how anyone is going to pull it off and make it a unified package that insures a comparable offering across all the platforms.
> 
> I place a great deal of importance on the idea that DIRECTV producing the NFLST product (by assembling licensed content from multiple sources) was critical to the success of the package. NFLST isn't just a glorified LiL lookalike.


Yeah, i don’t see the nfl being in the direct to consumer business with all the uncertainties that go with it. They like sucking one big check much better and let someone else figure out to profit from it


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## Teetertotter (Jul 23, 2020)

Standing by to see what happens in 2023. Whatever it is, people will adjust to change or NOT, that want Sunday Ticket, from whomever. lol Channel Lineups are ever changing.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

harsh said:


> I place a great deal of importance on the idea that DIRECTV producing the NFLST product (by assembling licensed content from multiple sources) was critical to the success of the package. NFLST isn't just a glorified LiL lookalike.


I believe you are putting too much emphasis on "producing" NFL ST.

No, NFL ST isn't LiL - that is a straw argument. LiL are local channels delivered into local markets under long term contracts for long periods of time with no blackouts of the feeds delivered to customers. (LiL channels cannot even be edited or interrupted in any way - they must be carried as received for the duration of the contract.) I'm not sure where you got the idea that NFL ST was compared to LiL.

NFL ST is closer to the other league packages (NBA/NHL/MLB) where multiple feeds are received from sources and retransmitted nationally (with blackouts) via their service. In the case of the other leagues the source is usually the RSNs that produce local game coverage ... often in cooperation with each other to where both home and visiting team are showing the same game coverage from the same cameras the majority of the time with different announcers and graphics. Occasionally an RSN will cut away from the shared feed to show their announcers or their teams bench or other team related content. NFL ST gets their feeds from CBS and FOX. Less feeds to deal with than most game nights on NBA/NHL/MLB.

Blackouts are key to the NBA/NHL/MLB packages and are also key to NFL ST. Multiple MVPDs are able to successfully deliver those league packages with appropriate blackouts. Provide clear instruction from CBS and FOX as to what games are being delivered locally where and any MVPD/vMVPD can do blackouts. There is nothing produced for NFL ST that cannot be done by any high end production company. While the current NFL ST product is distributed exclusively by DIRECTV do you have any proof that direct DIRECTV employees produce content for NFL ST? If so, is it content that no one else can produce?



harsh said:


> James Long said:
> 
> 
> > I am surprised that the NFL didn't do their own streaming or pick a streaming partner sooner.
> ...


I was referring to years ago when the exclusive streaming of games via Verizon Wireless ended.



harsh said:


> James Long said:
> 
> 
> > I can see "NFL ST for Business" being offered as long as it is profitable for DIRECTV and whomever gets an exclusive contract (if an exclusive deal is cut).
> ...


Some people believe that commercial distribution is required for NFL ST to succeed. "NFL ST for Business" via DIRECTV sold like "ESPN+ for Business" should satisfy those people's worries about businesses (who would already have DIRECTV in place for the current NFL ST package) being able to continue delivering the content to their patrons in the future.

"NFL ST for Business" via DIRECTV would resolve all of the complaints about bandwidth to businesses, additional stream receivers needed, video switch matrix upgrades needed, etc. that would come with a change to broadband only.


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## wmb (Dec 18, 2008)

BTW, with Amazon Prime’s 150 million subscribers, this price increase alone would increase annual revenues by $3 billion, more than enough to pay for Sunday Ticket. 









Amazon's profit nearly doubles as company raises Prime fees to cover costs


The e-commerce giant hopes investments like Thursday Night Football will keep the service attractive.




www.cnet.com






Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

Give yourself and extra year of Amazon Prime at $119.00

*Gift Yourself 1-Year of Amazon Prime Right Now*
Existing members will start to pay the new prices for Amazon Prime from March 25, 2022. If you are one of the millions currently paying for Amazon Prime in the US, there is a small hack you can do to pay just $119, instead of $139, for at least one more year. 

This trick involves gifting yourself one year of Prime for $119 right now while the price is still locked in, and then cancelling your Prime membership before your auto-renewal date. Once your membership has fully expired, simply activate the gifted Prime membership and you're done, another year of Amazon Prime for $119. I've broken these steps down below as well, just to keep things as simple as possible. 


Gift Yourself a Prime Membership for $119 now (*see here*)
Set a reminder to cancel your Prime membership
Manually cancel your membership a day before it expires (preventing auto-renewal)
*Important:* Wait for your membership to end
Redeem your "gifted" Prime membership


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

From today's Disney earning report:

Disney CEO Bob Chapek Confirms NFL Sunday Ticket Bid (thewrap.com)


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## bjlc (Aug 20, 2004)

there is a movement to remove Bob Chapek so don't count on this one at all.. as a Disney stock holder i know this for a fact...


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

glrush said:


> From today's Disney earning report:
> 
> Disney CEO Bob Chapek Confirms NFL Sunday Ticket Bid (thewrap.com)


Should they win the bid, I'd expect ESPN+ to do with the same thing with NFLST as I expect Apple TV+ would do, which is to price it so that purchasing the season comes with a one-year subscription to the base service. ESPN+ only costs $70/yr while Apple TV+ costs $50/yr. Giving someone a year of your service -- especially if it's in the same app where they'd go to watch NFLST (which I expect would be the case) -- is a good way to get people to sample it and find enough value in it over time that they'd choose to keep it going forward, regardless of whether they continue to buy NFLST every season.

Heck, I guess it's possible we could see Disney go so far as to price NFLST so that it includes the entire Disney bundle (Hulu w/ ads, Disney+ and ESPN+), either for a full year or at least the length of the NFL season.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

bjlc said:


> there is a movement to remove Bob Chapek so don't count on this one at all.. as a Disney stock holder i know this for a fact...


Do you really think that Disney is going to change their mind about NFLST based on who sits in the big chair?


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

NashGuy said:


> Should they win the bid, I'd expect ESPN+ to do with the same thing with NFLST as I expect Apple TV+ would do, which is to price it so that purchasing the season comes with a one-year subscription to the base service. ESPN+ only costs $70/yr while Apple TV+ costs $50/yr.


Subsidizing isn't something that the streaming model was built on.

Adding another $50 to the cost of NFLST for what NFL fans might gain through either service seems like a tough sell.


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## bjlc (Aug 20, 2004)

harsh said:


> Do you really think that Disney is going to change their mind about NFLST based on who sits in the big chair?


yes.. because anything he does or has been doing is seen as a mess.. so if Chapek is a part of it.. its not a good idea.. that's the feeling among the shareholders..


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## compnurd (Apr 23, 2007)

bjlc said:


> yes.. because anything he does or has been doing is seen as a mess.. so if Chapek is a part of it.. its not a good idea.. that's the feeling among the shareholders..


They have been chasing this since Iger.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

harsh said:


> Subsidizing isn't something that the streaming model was built on.


LOL. You realize that ALL of these streaming services are money-losers for several years before they're even _projected_ to become profitable, right? It costs a ton of money to create/acquire a viable content library in the early stages, along with the costs to market and operate the service. Disney+, which has been the most successful streaming launch we've seen yet, still isn't expected to become profitable until fiscal year 2024, after having launched in Nov. 2019.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

NashGuy said:


> You realize that ALL of these streaming services are money-losers for several years before they're even _projected_ to become profitable, right?


I was speaking more to the idea that NFLST probably wouldn't be subsidized by a subscription to <service>+ and vice versa.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

harsh said:


> Adding another $50 to the cost of NFLST for what NFL fans might gain through either service seems like a tough sell.


It depends on what the final price ends up being. Clear your mind of what DIRECTV charges (when they charge). If a company makes an exclusive deal they will base their price on how much they are paying the NFL and how many subscriptions they expect to sell. The "extra" $50/$70 may not be noticeable at all.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

NFL having “lots of conversations” about Sunday Ticket


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

b4pjoe said:


> NFL having “lots of conversations” about Sunday Ticket


_‘We’re looking for strategic partners for our owned and operated assets, which include the NFL Network and the Red Zone Channel,” Rolapp said. “We’re talking about some pretty interesting partnerships with NFL Films so we can increase the NFL Films presence on streaming platforms.”_

If the NFL is more interested in non-linear content than the linear streamed Sunday games then the streamers have an advantage. The Sunday Ticket games could become a part of a bigger package. The NFL (through a provider) could offer "one year of football" which would include the NFL Films library, game replays and game summary videos along with other content. Subscriptions could run from the beginning of pre-season games to the first regular season games of the next season (with an overlap). They could even sell a summer package - full library access Superbowl to first regular season games for a discount.

We need to get out of the rut of replicating what DIRECTV has delivered though Sunday Ticket and understand that the NFL has more content to offer that a satellite provider is not in the best position to provide.

Amazon has paid $1 billion for exclusive delivery of the only game on Thursday night (in market TV for each team allowed). The Sunday games are not exclusive (all are available for national network TV broadcast) and the network broadcast of other games is competition against Sunday Ticket. The availability of NFL Network's own Red Zone is competition against Sunday Ticket for those who don't care about the full game and only want to watch teams score. $1 billion for the only game available vs $?? billion for more games but more competition.

The inclusion of non-linear content and the concept that this could be a "one year of football" style offering means we could be seeing a $5 billion dollar deal (more or less) that covers more than DIRECTV ever delivered. Not an exact comparison against what DIRECTV paid $1.5 billion to deliver.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

James Long said:


> The availability of NFL Network's own Red Zone is competition against Sunday Ticket for those who don't care about the full game and only want to watch teams score.


That would be me. I've never "bought" NFL Sunday Ticket. When I have gotten NFL Sunday Ticket free I barely watch any out of market games but the last two season I've gotten NFL ST Max free and I watch Redzone on Sundays. I'd buy that by itself if it was available not tied to any provider.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

James Long said:


> _‘We’re looking for strategic partners for our owned and operated assets, which include the NFL Network and the Red Zone Channel,” Rolapp said. “We’re talking about some pretty interesting partnerships with NFL Films so we can increase the NFL Films presence on streaming platforms.”_


Yes, I had read that the NFL is talking about selling a stake in their media assets. Do you think this could mean that, for instance, NFL Network or Red Zone ceases to exist, with that channel's content becoming exclusive to a streaming service, whether part of an overall NFLST subscription or otherwise somehow part of their main service (e.g. Apple TV+, Prime Video, ESPN+)? Or perhaps that NFL Network/Red Zone continues to exist as a linear cable channel but virtually all of its content is available at the same time on the owner's streaming service (similar to how NBC content is available on Peacock)?


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

b4pjoe said:


> That would be me. I've never "bought" NFL Sunday Ticket. When I have gotten NFL Sunday Ticket free I barely watch any out of market games but the last two season I've gotten NFL ST Max free and I watch Redzone on Sundays. I'd buy that by itself if it was available not tied to any provider.


I have the NFL Network version of Red Zone that is available through multiple MVPDs (not tied to a specific provider). I would not expect the NFL to make that available without a MVPD subscription (other than a "Sunday Ticket" or "one year of football" subscription).

If the networks choose the local games wisely I believe most people could survive on Red Zone and the games broadcast on TV in their area. Only the die hard fans of a team that doesn't get carried in their market would need more than that.



NashGuy said:


> Do you think this could mean that, for instance, NFL Network or Red Zone ceases to exist, with that channel's content becoming exclusive to a streaming service, whether part of an overall NFLST subscription or otherwise somehow part of their main service (e.g. Apple TV+, Prime Video, ESPN+)? Or perhaps that NFL Network/Red Zone continues to exist as a linear cable channel but virtually all of its content is available at the same time on the owner's streaming service (similar to how NBC content is available on Peacock)?


I hope they do not cease to exist. I believe their wide availability is serving the NFL well. The second option is what I was thinking. NFL Network and Red Zone available via MVPDs as they are now with the "one year of football" service providing streaming access.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

James Long said:


> I have the NFL Network version of Red Zone that is available through multiple MVPDs (not tied to a specific provider). I would not expect the NFL to make that available without a MVPD subscription (other than a "Sunday Ticket" or "one year of football" subscription).


Which would be OK if my MVPD (DirecTV Satellite) would let you buy Redzone as a separate option say for the same $11 per month YTTV charges. I'd much rather pay $11 per month than $400 For NFLST Maxx which is the only way to get Redzone With DirecTV.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

I perfer Andrew Siciliano RZC 

I had the other one when I had fios years ago didn't like it 

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


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## codespy (Mar 30, 2006)

Me too.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

Random but apparently theres an app that shows all the Sports Bars that have D*









Find DIRECTV at Local Sports Bars


DIRECTV offers sports bars and restaurants the sports programming and tools to grow their business and be the local sports headquarters.




entertainment.directv.com





Thought it was similar to the topic since its always mentioned how many business/bars have NFL ST


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## codespy (Mar 30, 2006)

We have had that app for over 7 years now even before ATT took over, and used it many times when looking to go somewhere when out and about.

Edit- I probably shouldn’t say ‘we’- it’s more like ‘I’. It is not something my wife would ever use as It’s probably more of a ‘guy’ thing. 🤔


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

This article confirms from a DirecTV Executive that DirecTV is interested in keeping Sunday Ticket even though it would be, in the words of the NFL a "co-exclusive". 

Super Bowl Is Over, Now It's Time to See Where NFL Sunday Ticket Will Land - CNET


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

"Co-exclusive" is a pretty slimy marketing oxymoron.


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## compnurd (Apr 23, 2007)

glrush said:


> This article confirms from a DirecTV Executive that DirecTV is interested in keeping Sunday Ticket even though it would be, in the words of the NFL a "co-exclusive".
> 
> Super Bowl Is Over, Now It's Time to See Where NFL Sunday Ticket Will Land - CNET


Keeping is the wrong word You really need all of his quote for context

"The NFL … I don't think they were interested in an exclusive relationship beyond the term of our underlying deal," Rob Thun, DirecTV's chief content officer, said in an interview with CNET last week. "And what form the licensing takes with one partner or many is still undetermined, and we'll see how that plays out."
Thun says that his company is still interested in offering the service even if it means it's through what he says the league calls a "co-exclusive" where the rights would be split between companies.


That reads Its Gone from us as an exclusive and if there is a window for whatever happens to it we can offer it we will if we dont have to pay for it


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

The way the Directv "chief content officer" describes his conversations with the NFL, it sounds like they are not too keen on going streaming only. So "co-exclusive" to me means that the NFL sells exclusive MVPD distribution rights and exclusive streaming distributions. So maybe Directv keeps NFLST in its current form as a linear exclusive, and Amazon or Apple or ESPN also offers it as the exclusive streaming partner.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

glrush said:


> This article confirms from a DirecTV Executive that DirecTV is interested in keeping Sunday Ticket even though it would be, in the words of the NFL a "co-exclusive".
> 
> Super Bowl Is Over, Now It's Time to See Where NFL Sunday Ticket Will Land - CNET


Interesting article. Surprised to read that industry analyst Brad Sappington thinks that, should they win the bid, Amazon would include NFLST in Prime and Apple in Apple TV+ for no extra cost in either case. He was uncertain about whether ESPN+ might charge extra should they land the deal though. IDK, if the deal included a big ownership stake in NFL Media, as is rumored could be the case, maybe any of those streaming services would include NFL RedZone at no extra cost while still charging extra for the full NFLST. Especially hard to see why Apple would give that away as part of their $5/mo Apple TV+ service.

As for DTV retaining exclusive satellite/MVPD distribution rights to NFLST, I have to wonder how much it would be worth for them if a major streaming service will also be offering NFLST, which at this point looks like will definitely happen. I don't see many folks signing up for, or sticking with, DTV satellite if they could get it for the same (or even lower) price via streaming without having to pay for a base satellite TV service in the first place. Sure, having the option of paying to get NFLST via your DTV Genie receiver would be convenient if you're already a DTV sub and aren't itching to leave. But as I say, I don't see how it does much to attract or retain DTV subs.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

glrush said:


> This article confirms from a DirecTV Executive that DirecTV is interested in keeping Sunday Ticket even though it would be, in the words of the NFL a "co-exclusive".


DIRECTV will be lucky to get anything other than the full exclusive that the NFL wants more more money for and DIRECTV wants to pay less for.

I read "co-exclusive" as exclusive by category. They may be able to become "the exclusive satellite partner" of NFL ST ... although I hope the NFL charges a lot of money to shut DISH out of providing the service on an "any MVPD that wants to carry the package" basis. Perhaps "the exclusive commercial delivery partner" of NFL ST and allow one streamer to have the exclusive residential deal. Both paying the NFL a fat flat fee for the privilege of delivering the programming.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

slice1900 said:


> So maybe Directv keeps NFLST in its current form as a linear exclusive, and Amazon or Apple or ESPN also offers it as the exclusive streaming partner.


Why would someone seek a linear offering (as if live streaming weren't linear by definition)? I suspect you may be talking about something else entirely.

I see the presence of a dedicated Prev button as one of maybe a few advantages that DIRECTV offers in addition to its coverage possibilities (as opposed to its likely ravaging by streaming options).


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

I truly hope it will still be an option on DirecTV for residential customers. 

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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

dtv757 said:


> truly hope it will still be an option on DirecTV for residential customers.


Anything is possible but I wouldn't bet on it.

If you feel compelled to reply, do NOT use the acronym DOCSIS to represent your residential Cox broadband service. The terms are not interchangeable. We all recognize that Cox isn't your friend. Feel free to use "Cox" (or "cox" if you must) instead.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

harsh said:


> Why would someone seek a linear offering (as if live streaming weren't linear by definition)? I suspect you may be talking about something else entirely.
> 
> I see the presence of a dedicated Prev button as one of maybe a few advantages that DIRECTV offers in addition to its coverage possibilities (as opposed to its likely ravaging by streaming options).


In my opinion linear = traditional TV providers (Sat , Telco , .... cable co ... ) 

Streaming/OTT is all that other internet stuff like FUBO TV, YTTV ... and all the others 

So yea I'm ok with that D* keeping exclusive for linear for both residential and SMB ... 
And one of those streaming things (apple , Amazon, disney) also having NFL ST for cord cutters or folks who don't /can't have D* like who live in an MDU .

I know we have the nflsundayticket.tv thing now but I think he's describing without the current restrictions . 

Some would keep D* . Im very happy with D* . 




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## raott (Nov 23, 2005)

dtv757 said:


> In my opinion linear = traditional TV providers (Sat , Telco , .... cable co ... )
> 
> Streaming/OTT is all that other internet stuff like FUBO TV, YTTV ... and all the others
> 
> ...


That's great, but that is 100% not happening. Directv is NOT keeping an exclusive hold for ST for residential.


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

raott said:


> That's great, but that is 100% not happening. Directv is NOT keeping an exclusive hold for ST for residential.


Directv having a linear exclusive would mean they would be the only cable/satellite company offering NFLST. The streaming exclusive would mean that there would a streaming service like Amazon Prime or ESPN+ that would also offer it.

So no exclusive hold on NFLST for residential, as you could get it either via Directv or whoever won the streaming exclusive, but it might remain exclusive for commercial.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

slice1900 said:


> Directv having a linear exclusive would mean they would be the only cable/satellite company offering NFLST.


The term "MVPD" would make more sense in this context though I'm still at a loss to understand how DIRECTV having an exclusive would benefit even DIRECTV since most of the other MVPDs (other than DISH) could deliver the product via their broadband service.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

slice1900 said:


> Directv having a linear exclusive would mean they would be the only cable/satellite company offering NFLST. The streaming exclusive would mean that there would a streaming service like Amazon Prime or ESPN+ that would also offer it.


Are you considering streaming to be non-linear?

NFL ST is a combination product containing the live linear feeds on Sunday plus on demand (non-linear) content later in the week. I don't see a streamer signing on unless they can deliver the live linear feeds on Sunday.

What DIRECTV wants is to pay as little as possible and have as much exclusivity as possible. The NFL has not accepted that offer. "Co-exclusive" is probably not possible unless the part of the carriage DIRECTV gets does not conflict with any service that the other exclusive partner could provide. I don't see any streamer signing an "exclusive streaming partner" deal and letting DIRECTV Stream carry the programming. I don't see DIRECTV signing a deal that would allow residential satellite but not stream. DIRECTV can wish all they want.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

harsh said:


> The term "MVPD" would make more sense in this context though I'm still at a loss to understand how DIRECTV having an exclusive would benefit even DIRECTV since most of the other MVPDs (other than DISH) could deliver the product via their broadband service.


Yeah, as I said above, it's hard to see how DTV satellite having an exclusive among MVPDs would help their sub numbers all that much if anyone with broadband could get NFLST via a streaming provider at a lower total price than what it costs for DTV+NFLST (and without the hassle of a 2-year contract and a rooftop dish).


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

Future of Sunday Ticket remains very fluid - ProFootballTalk (nbcsports.com)


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

glrush said:


> Future of Sunday Ticket remains very fluid - ProFootballTalk (nbcsports.com)


Nothing new here.

How much market would be left in those typically very rural customers who don't have broadband?


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

glrush said:


> Future of Sunday Ticket remains very fluid - ProFootballTalk (nbcsports.com)


"Recent reports have suggested that the winning bidder could pay as much as $7.5 billion per year, three times the current DirecTV rate. We’ve been unable to nail down that number."

Probably because 3 times $1.5 billion is $4.5 billion. Five times $1.5 billion is $7.5 billion.

"However it’s structured, it will be a streaming service, first and foremost. Although it seemed possible that the NFL would retain DirecTV as the satellite provider and sell the streaming rights to a tech company, it now appears (per a source with knowledge of the dynamics) that the league will sell the whole package to a tech company, which then may break off satellite rights to be sold only to consumers (typically, very rural) who lack access to the kind of Internet service needed for reliable streaming. That could be DirecTV, it could be Dish Network, it could be both, and it could be neither."

An anonymous source, of course. Probably one reading speculation in this thread and others.


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## the2130 (Dec 18, 2014)

The notion that a single bidder will pay $7.5 billion for Sunday Ticket seems outlandish, which makes the whole article seem like uninformed speculation. Bookmark the article and see how it matches up to reality when the new deal is announced, which it should be soon.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

Here's a random thought .. whats gonna happen go Andrew Siciliano and the Fantasy Zone crew ... will they continue to broadcast with new deal?

Just a random thought.. 

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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

dtv757 said:


> Here's a random thought .. whats gonna happen go Andrew Siciliano and the Fantasy Zone crew ... will they continue to broadcast with new deal?


It is surely too soon to even speculate.


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

I hope DirecTV at least gets access to the stand alone Red Zone channel.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

I perfer the Andrew Siciliano one  

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## codespy (Mar 30, 2006)

dtv757 said:


> I perfer the Andrew Siciliano one
> 
> Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


I do too, but at least he still gets a paycheck from NFL Network when ST/RedZone ends on DirecTV.

Since NFL copied DirecTV’s RedZone, maybe they let DirecTV keep their own RedZone after the current ST deal expires and moves to a different provider, Lol….


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

glrush said:


> I hope DirecTV at least gets access to the stand alone Red Zone channel.


I don't see why they wouldn't get the NFL Network version ... or perhaps everyone will get a Andrew Siciliano version. Other than personal preference for the host, is there any material difference between the content? Both are following the same premise with the same available content to show.


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## wmb (Dec 18, 2008)

James Long said:


> "Recent reports have suggested that the winning bidder could pay as much as $7.5 billion per year, three times the current DirecTV rate. We’ve been unable to nail down that number."
> 
> Probably because 3 times $1.5 billion is $4.5 billion. Five times $1.5 billion is $7.5 billion.


I thought I read for the previous broadcast deal, the yearly cost was not constant, but incremented annually, so the final year was pretty much double the first year of the about 10 year deal.

It wouldn’t surprise me if the last year of an $1.5 billion per year, 10 year deal wasn’t up about $2.5 billion.

I was starting to think that DirecTV could be bought out of the final year of the deal under the right conditions. Assuming the last year of the deal is the most expensive, and subscriber counts are down, I’m starting to wonder if a deal isn’t struck for next season.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

wmb said:


> I thought I read for the previous broadcast deal, the yearly cost was not constant, but incremented annually, so the final year was pretty much double the first year of the about 10 year deal.
> 
> It wouldn’t surprise me if the last year of an $1.5 billion per year, 10 year deal wasn’t up about $2.5 billion.











DirecTV keeps NFL Sunday Ticket in $1.5 billion a year deal


DirecTV <DTV.O> extended its exclusive contract to sell the Sunday Ticket package of National Football League games, and sources said the company will pay $1.5 billion a year to keep the popular offering that has helped attract subscribers.




www.reuters.com




"Sources familiar with the agreement said DirecTV’s annual payments to the NFL would average $1.5 billion for eight years."









NFL, DirecTV sign deal reportedly worth $12 billion over 8 years


If you like watching Sunday Ticket on DirecTV, the next eight years should be magical for you.




www.cbssports.com





Sooo .... if there was an escalator it would have started below $1.5 billion in order to be greater than $1.5 billion for the final year. The NFL was paying $1 billion per year prior to the last extension. That leaves $4 billion over 8 years for increases. If the final year is $2.5 billion that would leave $9.5 billion for the previous seven years (average $1.35 billion). It would be a steep escalation for the final year. The closer the final year gets to $1.5 billion the more likely that the number is correct.


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## wmb (Dec 18, 2008)

James Long said:


> DirecTV keeps NFL Sunday Ticket in $1.5 billion a year deal
> 
> 
> DirecTV <DTV.O> extended its exclusive contract to sell the Sunday Ticket package of National Football League games, and sources said the company will pay $1.5 billion a year to keep the popular offering that has helped attract subscribers.
> ...


Not feeling like doing math tonight, but maybe both contracts escalate. 

So, one contract goes from $1 billion to $2 billion, averaging $1.5 billion. The next goes from $6 billion to $9 billion, averaging $7.5 billion. Does that meet both the tripling of the current rate and averaging $7.5 billion?


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

wmb said:


> Not feeling like doing math tonight, but maybe both contracts escalate.
> 
> So, one contract goes from $1 billion to $2 billion, averaging $1.5 billion. The next goes from $6 billion to $9 billion, averaging $7.5 billion. Does that meet both the tripling of the current rate and averaging $7.5 billion?



There is absolutely no chance in hell the NFL gets $7.5 billion. They will be lucky to get a third of that.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

The reports when the last two deals were signed were clear ... averaging $1 billion per year prior to the 2014 renewal, averaging $1.5 billion per year for the last eight years. $12 billion for 8 years.

A 10% each year would be close to the $12 billion total:
$1.1 + $1.21 + $1.33 + $1.46 + $1.61 + $1.77 + $1.95 + $2.14 = $12.57 (billion)
(This assumes they started at $1 billion in 2013.)

If the NFL gets more than $2.5-$3 billion for an NFLST exclusive it will have to include more content. Perhaps the full NFL Films library. (Watch any game any year any time? or at least the good ones.) I can see a higher price if a lot more content is included. The price to consumer would likely need to be higher as well. "One year of football for only $1 per day ($365 per year)"? $1.25 per day ($456 per year)? There is a potential to make money if a company can get enough subscribers.


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## wmb (Dec 18, 2008)

James Long said:


> A 10% each year would be close to the $12 billion total:
> $1.1 + $1.21 + $1.33 + $1.46 + $1.61 + $1.77 + $1.95 + $2.14 = $12.57 (billion)
> (This assumes they started at $1 billion in 2013.)
> 
> If the NFL gets more than $2.5-$3 billion for an NFLST exclusive it will have to include more content.


Two things to be certain of…

1. Year 1 of the new deal will cost more than the last year of the current deal.

2. The price will go up each year of the deal.

The other point was that other recent deals (NFL and NHL) came in well above expectations.

As for the other NFL content, Amazon bought MGM last year for over $8 billion. That included the library of films and rights to things like James Bond and other film franchises along with working production studios. That may be a benchmark for the NFL contents value.

One last thought… the amount of sports on broadcast networks seems to be decreasing. Fewer games are being broadcast in favor of streaming. Moreover, who knows what will happen with the linear broadcast marketplace. The NFL needs to look ahead to 2033, the end of the current broadcast deal.


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## TheRatPatrol (Oct 1, 2003)

*DirecTV Mulls 'Co-Exclusive' Arrangement for NFL Sunday Ticket*



https://www.nexttv.com/news/directv-mulls-co-exclusive-arrangement-for-nfl-sunday-ticket


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

TheRatPatrol said:


> *DirecTV Mulls 'Co-Exclusive' Arrangement for NFL Sunday Ticket*


Wanting something desperately and having a snowball's chance are two entirely different situations.


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## compnurd (Apr 23, 2007)

TheRatPatrol said:


> *DirecTV Mulls 'Co-Exclusive' Arrangement for NFL Sunday Ticket*
> 
> 
> 
> https://www.nexttv.com/news/directv-mulls-co-exclusive-arrangement-for-nfl-sunday-ticket


Thats the same article posted the other day


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## Mighty Mac (11 mo ago)

wilbur_the_goose said:


> What’s next? Sunday Ticket was the only reason I’ve remained a D* client. Been with them since 1996, and I’m emotionally ready to move.
> 
> I loved the pre-ATT DirecTV, but the Blue Orb killed the service. So damn sad.
> 
> I’ll be looking at alternatives casually Odds are probably 25% I’ll stay, but the poor customer service has killed my enthusiasm.


I have been with DirecTV since 1997. If/when DirecTV loses the SundayTicket, I'll be leaving. Programming price inceases and all the fees for receivers has gotten to the point where i just cannot justify $200/month for programming. Also, the customer service has just gone down hill since AT&T took over.


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## raott (Nov 23, 2005)

compnurd said:


> Thats the same article posted the other day


Yep...except Florio's erroneous $7.5 billion number (because he can't multiply) is now changed to $7.5 million in that article. Does anyone fact check?


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

Mighty Mac said:


> If/when DirecTV loses the SundayTicket, I'll be leaving.


DIRECTV losing NFLST is the premise of this thread. DIRECTV's CEO has been up front (and unwavering) about not wanting to maintain their current arrangement so that seems to support the premise.

The distractions about what residential subscribers and commercial venues without broadband will do and the DIRECTV Chief Content Officer's pipe dreams aside, you'll probably be with another provider by this time next year so it is time to start shopping. The result of your survey _may_ be DIRECTV but it won't be because of NFLST.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

raott said:


> Does anyone fact check?


Blogging (and Fox News) has substantially relegated fact checking to the status of "unnecessary roughness".


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

raott said:


> compnurd said:
> 
> 
> > Thats the same article posted the other day
> ...


Different website and reworded. Just another story sourced from another story with no firm sources at the root of the story.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

TheRatPatrol said:


> *DirecTV Mulls 'Co-Exclusive' Arrangement for NFL Sunday Ticket*
> 
> 
> 
> https://www.nexttv.com/news/directv-mulls-co-exclusive-arrangement-for-nfl-sunday-ticket





> NBC added that the NFL" may break off satellite rights to be sold *only* to consumers (typically, very rural) who lack access to the kind of Internet service needed for reliable streaming. That could be DirecTV, it could be Dish Network, it could be both, and it could be neither."


Yeah I'm sure DirecTV is going to spend a billion or 2 to only be able to sell it to rural customers that don't have broadband. Sorry to all of you satellite customers that have broadband...we can't sell it to you.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

b4pjoe said:


> Yeah I'm sure DirecTV is going to spend a billion or 2 to only be able to sell it to rural customers that don't have broadband.


Nobody said that this fantasy partnership should cost DIRECTV that much.


> Sorry to all of you satellite customers that have broadband...we can't sell it to you.


That sounds an awful lot like what the people who want to stream NFLST are being told now so it certainly isn't unthinkable.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

harsh said:


> Nobody said that this fantasy partnership should cost DIRECTV that much.


Why would DirecTV be interested in paying _*anything*_ that limits that they can only sell it to a small portion of their subscribers?


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

b4pjoe said:


> Why would DirecTV be interested in paying _*anything*_ that limits that they can only sell it to a small portion of their subscribers?


That's a question you need to be asking of DIRECTV's Chief Content Officer who spawned the idea of a "co-exclusive".


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## JoeTheDragon (Jul 21, 2008)

b4pjoe said:


> Yeah I'm sure DirecTV is going to spend a billion or 2 to only be able to sell it to rural customers that don't have broadband. Sorry to all of you satellite customers that have broadband...we can't sell it to you.


all commercial should get it as the broadband need is an lot higher then home use and what level of broadband??


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

JoeTheDragon said:


> all commercial should get it as the broadband need is an lot higher then home use and what level of broadband??


How the venues distribute the programming is their problem -- if it is worth the investment, they'll find a way.

The NFL benefits greatly given that a majority of the US population has sufficient Internet bandwidth versus DIRECTV who could only reasonably deliver it to their customers who don't.

It is the opposite of what's going on now where streaming is only an option (for the most part) if DIRECTV DBS isn't. The population of those with broadband is orders of magnitude larger than those with DIRECTV subscriptions.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

harsh said:


> That's a question you need to be asking of DIRECTV's Chief Content Officer who spawned the idea of a "co-exclusive".


What he actually said was:



> The league, Thun added, might be interested in a "co-exclusive" arrangement. "They understand that the money still largely comes through the traditional TV bill, pay-TV doors, and they don't want to close the door on that entirely," Thun said.


He was not the one who said:



> NBC added that the NFL" may break off satellite rights to be sold *only* to consumers (typically, very rural) who lack access to the kind of Internet service needed for reliable streaming.


He would be a fool to ever suggest such a thing. Of course he works for AT&T so that is a possibility.


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

From SBJ: 

Sports Media: Sources: Apple, Amazon front-runners for Sunday Ticket (sportsbusinessjournal.com) 

Couple of things from the article: 
Amazon and Apple are viewed as the leaders, with Disney not offering as much
Total cost of the package likely more that 2 Billion Dollars
DirecTV is trying to keep a commercial license for bars, etc


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

b4pjoe said:


> Why would DirecTV be interested in paying _*anything*_ that limits that they can only sell it to a small portion of their subscribers?


All things considered, I can't see why DirecTV would pay an up-front amount to share NFLST with a streaming provider, even if they could sell it to ALL their satellite TV customers. Would make more sense is for the deal to be structured so that the the streamer has a deal in place with DTV to allow them to distribute the package to some/all their satellite customers with DTV getting to keep a certain amount per subscription that they sell. I don't know why the NFL would care about the specifics of that agreement but maybe they want such an agreement to be in place as a condition of the main contract between the NFL and the streamer so that they don't get backlash from sports bars and/or rural residents for leaving them out.


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## forecheck (Jun 13, 2002)

glrush said:


> From SBJ:
> 
> Sports Media: Sources: Apple, Amazon front-runners for Sunday Ticket (sportsbusinessjournal.com)
> 
> ...


Also

*CBS* and *Fox* have clauses in their NFL contracts mandating that Sunday Ticket can only be offered at a premium price, meaning that it likely will carry a similar price tag with a new partner as it does with DirecTV.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

forecheck said:


> *CBS* and *Fox* have clauses in their NFL contracts mandating that Sunday Ticket can only be offered at a premium price, meaning that it likely will carry a similar price tag with a new partner as it does with DirecTV.


Interesting. First I've heard of this.


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

NashGuy said:


> All things considered, I can't see why DirecTV would pay an up-front amount to share NFLST with a streaming provider, even if they could sell it to ALL their satellite TV customers. Would make more sense is for the deal to be structured so that the the streamer has a deal in place with DTV to allow them to distribute the package to some/all their satellite customers with DTV getting to keep a certain amount per subscription that they sell. I don't know why the NFL would care about the specifics of that agreement but maybe they want such an agreement to be in place as a condition of the main contract between the NFL and the streamer so that they don't get backlash from sports bars and/or rural residents for leaving them out.


It all depends on what the up front amount is. Directv would certainly be willing to pay some sort of a flat fee for commercial rights, since they have a pretty good idea how much they make from that (in non-pandemic years at least) and it would help keep their current commercial customer base intact.

If that fee also allowed them to offer NFLST to their residential satellite customers that would be good for them and for rural and older customers who would be less interested in streaming it. There's no way they'd make that a condition of getting commercial rights, but it would be worth paying a little extra for if only to stem the tide of defections.

If there's a way to stream it they will lose plenty of residential customers who only subscribe to Directv for NFLST, but not nearly as many as if they couldn't offer NFLST at all.


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## the2130 (Dec 18, 2014)

forecheck said:


> Also
> 
> *CBS* and *Fox* have clauses in their NFL contracts mandating that Sunday Ticket can only be offered at a premium price, meaning that it likely will carry a similar price tag with a new partner as it does with DirecTV.


Do you have any evidence to support that claim? The NFL has all the leverage in those contract negotiations, not the networks. It sounds like a reworked version of the old debunked theory that the value of the network contracts would plummet if the Sunday Ticket package became widely available. Makes no sense.


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

the2130 said:


> Do you have any evidence to support that claim? The NFL has all the leverage in those contract negotiations, not the networks. It sounds like a reworked version of the old debunked theory that the value of the network contracts would plummet if the Sunday Ticket package became widely available. Makes no sense.


Last paragraph of the article by SBJ


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

glrush said:


> From SBJ:
> Sports Media: Sources: Apple, Amazon front-runners for Sunday Ticket (sportsbusinessjournal.com)
> 
> Couple of things from the article:
> ...


I wish media would have SOLID sources and not keep referring to "several sources". As far as we know all these authors are doing is reading each other's articles or forums such as ours. When reading such articles I mentally red line through anything without any source and question anything with a nameless source.

Some articles will link or refer to other articles. In those cases one can go up the food chain and see if their source had a source. Repeating statements that have no clear source does not verify those statements. It just adds to the clutter and confuses those who do not seek the truth behind what they are reading.


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## the2130 (Dec 18, 2014)

glrush said:


> Last paragraph of the article by SBJ


The article provides no proof of that claim. Saying it doesn't make it a fact.


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## codespy (Mar 30, 2006)

the2130 said:


> Do you have any evidence to support that claim? The NFL has all the leverage in those contract negotiations, not the networks. It sounds like a reworked version of the old debunked theory that the value of the network contracts would plummet if the Sunday Ticket package became widely available. Makes no sense.


Do you have any evidence to support that claim?

You don’t have to answer that. A recent article was shared by a member here 7 hours ago coinciding with the topic. It’s not a crime, so no reason to kill the messengers.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

James Long said:


> I wish media would have SOLID sources and not keep referring to "several sources". As far as we know all these authors are doing is reading each other's articles or forums such as ours. When reading such articles I mentally red line through anything without any source and question anything with a nameless source.


People with access to secrets routinely leak info to journalists but only on the condition that they not be named, which could obviously cost them their jobs (or in some cases, worse). Just because a source isn't named doesn't mean that it isn't solid. Sure, it's possible that there's nothing to what's being reported, but the simple fact that the sources aren't named doesn't make it so.


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## Shades228 (Mar 18, 2008)

Amazon was a front runner the last time NFLST was up. However they were not able/willing to meet the local channel affiliate protections needed. NFLST is still making DTV a ton of money because of commercial accounts. The residential accounts help with overall quarterly revenue and the NFLST helps with increasing sub counts for that quarter. In order for any steaming service to get even a part of the offer they will need to disable VPN IP access and have very robust IP location tables. 

Unless the NFL added some sort of revenue share Fox and NBC do not care how much people pay for NFLST. They care that people with NFLST cannot bypass their rights to games in local markets.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

slice1900 said:


> It all depends on what the up front amount is. Directv would certainly be willing to pay some sort of a flat fee for commercial rights, since they have a pretty good idea how much they make from that (in non-pandemic years at least) and it would help keep their current commercial customer base intact.


Yes, true. That crossed my mind after I posted before. But I would imagine that the economics would work out pretty similarly -- in either case, DTV would retain a modest profit on NFLST distribution. Although in the way you're proposing there would be at least a small amount of risk in that the number of commercial subscribers in future years might fall short of what DTV expects based on past numbers. But, yeah, they should have a pretty solid estimate on what to expect there.




slice1900 said:


> If there's a way to stream it they will lose plenty of residential customers who only subscribe to Directv for NFLST, but not nearly as many as if they couldn't offer NFLST at all.


I disagree here. Assuming that under the new arrangement, DTV is charging the same amount for NFLST as the streaming provider (i.e. no longer giving it away for free, etc.), then I think they would lose about as many satellite subs that way versus not being able to offer it at all. Because once NFL-loving but unhappy DTV customers have a different way to buy NFLST, then they'll leave DTV regardless of whether they still offer NFLST or not. The only NFL lovers still sticking with DTV will be those who are happy enough with their base satellite TV service anyhow.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

NashGuy said:


> People with access to secrets routinely leak info to journalists but only on the condition that they not be named, which could obviously cost them their jobs (or in some cases, worse).


Responsible journalists usually refer to such people as "speaking on a condition of anonymity". As i stated, just saying "sources" gives the reader no reason to trust anything stated as being true. The source could be another unsourced article or even this thread.



NashGuy said:


> Just because a source isn't named doesn't mean that it isn't solid. Sure, it's possible that there's nothing to what's being reported, but the simple fact that the sources aren't named doesn't make it so.


Too many people fall for absolute lies because they fail to ask for a source. Correcting those misinformed people can be difficult as such people oddly demand proof from those correcting a story when they demanded no proof from the person who made the original statement.

I am not saying that such statements are absolutely false. What I am saying is that one should not blindly accept such statements as fact. They should not be repeated as fact.


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## the2130 (Dec 18, 2014)

codespy said:


> Do you have any evidence to support that claim?
> 
> You don’t have to answer that. A recent article was shared by a member here 7 hours ago coinciding with the topic. It’s not a crime, so no reason to kill the messengers.


I didn't read the article, so I didn't know the poster was quoting it when he made that comment. The author offers no evidence to support his claim and doesn't even say what is meant by a "premium price".


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## codespy (Mar 30, 2006)

the2130 said:


> I didn't read the article, so I didn't know the poster was quoting it when he made that comment. The author offers no evidence to support his claim and doesn't even say what is meant by a "premium price".


So, that’s on you even though the link was provided in the thread which most of us read.


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## the2130 (Dec 18, 2014)

codespy said:


> So, that’s on you even though the link was provided in the thread which most of us read.


The comment in question was not posted in quotes. It was posted as if it was the poster's own comment. And no, I don't read most of those articles about who will get the rights to Sunday Ticket. They are mostly just speculation, not facts.


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## compnurd (Apr 23, 2007)

Shades228 said:


> Amazon was a front runner the last time NFLST was up. However they were not able/willing to meet the local channel affiliate protections needed. NFLST is still making DTV a ton of money because of commercial accounts. The residential accounts help with overall quarterly revenue and the NFLST helps with increasing sub counts for that quarter. In order for any steaming service to get even a part of the offer they will need to disable VPN IP access and have very robust IP location tables.
> 
> Unless the NFL added some sort of revenue share Fox and NBC do not care how much people pay for NFLST. They care that people with NFLST cannot bypass their rights to games in local markets.


Not sure what rock you have been living under but including commercial accounts Directv is losing several hundred million dollars a year on Sunday ticket. As part of the spin-off agreement ATT was covering those losses for the last two years of the contract


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

James Long said:


> I wish media would have SOLID sources and not keep referring to "several sources".


There's also the ubiquitous "unnamed sources".


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

the2130 said:


> The author offers no evidence to support his claim and doesn't even say what is meant by a "premium price".


In this case, I'd assume that NFLST could not be part of a basic package (i.e. included in an Amazon Prime, Apple TV+ or ESPN+ subscription).

I can't imagine how a third party contract could establish minimum consumer pricing without running afoul of the law.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

Does anyone realistically think that NFLST would ever be just a part of a basic package (i.e. included in an Amazon Prime ($139 per year), Apple TV+ ($60 per year) or ESPN+ subscription ($70 per year)) which DirecTV has been getting almost $300 for it + large fees for commercial establishments and still couldn't make money?


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

b4pjoe said:


> Does anyone realistically think that NFLST would ever be just a part of a basic package (i.e. included in an Amazon Prime ($139 per year), Apple TV+ ($60 per year) or ESPN+ subscription ($70 per year)) which DirecTV has been getting almost $300 for it + large fees for commercial establishments and still couldn't make money?


Probably not. But consider the fact that Amazon is spending $465 million for just the first season of their upcoming Lord of the Rings series, which will be included in Prime Video at no extra cost. Or the fact that they're paying the NFL $1 billion per year for the next 11 years for Prime Video to be the exclusive source for Thursday Night Football aside from local broadcast TV.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

b4pjoe said:


> Does anyone realistically think that NFLST would ever be just a part of a basic package


Given the increasingly transient nature of OTT subscriptions, not in today's marketplace. Of course if the OTT offerors all migrate to an annual package model (that many might not be able to front the money for) inclusion could come back into play. I could also see a situation where the annual package might include NFLST in lieu of a pre-payment discount.


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## the2130 (Dec 18, 2014)

Another article showed up in my Google news feed this morning about Sunday Ticket, this one referencing the Ourand piece and quoting the part about the networks having clauses in their contract that give them control over DirecTV's Sunday Ticket pricing. Unfortunately that seems to be what most of these articles are - bloggers regurgitating what they've read in other blogs. 

Regarding the unsubstatiated claim that the networks have clauses that give them control of what DirecTV charges for NFLST, consider the fact that DirecTV substantially reduced the price at one time. A few years ago, when the price of the package was around $300, DirecTV reduced it to $199 to get more subscribers. Does that sound like the networks have any control of Sunday Ticket pricing?


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

the2130 said:


> Does that sound like the networks have any control of Sunday Ticket pricing?


It is still a premium. It is just a cheaper premium. It is not like DIRECTV gave it to all of their customers or even included it in a tier without a premium price. It is obvious that DIRECTV can give it away to at least some customers, but without the contract we can only guess the terms. And likely be as wrong as the bloggers. Too much guessing and not enough reliable sources.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

the2130 said:


> bloggers regurgitating what they've read in other blogs.


This is pretty much the textbook definition of blogging except that it may include unofficial interpretations official information.

Some bloggers actually install and test what they're talking about but those are products that are nearly or already done. Future business direction isn't something that typically gets beta tested (unless you're Apple).

NDAs almost universally prohibit those close to the situation from disclosing details at any step in the process. At the same time, those who are interested will continue to theorize about what could be and that often gets confused with what should or must be.


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## the2130 (Dec 18, 2014)

I doubt most of these bloggers even have any sources. They are just reading other blogs and repeating or paraphrasing what others are saying. I never even heard of Ourand before this, but now a bunch of other bloggers are latching onto his post and quoting the part about the networks having clauses in their contracts regarding the pricing of Sunday Ticket. That's probably what he intended - post something that hasn't been reported before, get a bunch of other bloggers to quote it and link to it, and generate a bunch of clicks.


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## krel (Mar 20, 2013)

raott said:


> That's great, but that is 100% not happening. Directv is NOT keeping an exclusive hold for ST for residential.


I think they might keep it but it won't be exclusive to dtv anymore. Though it would open up competition.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

krel said:


> I think they might keep it but it won't be exclusive to dtv anymore. Though it would open up competition.


It depends on who wants it as an exclusive and how many billions of dollars they throw at the NFL.


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## krel (Mar 20, 2013)

James Long said:


> It depends on who wants it as an exclusive and how many billions of dollars they throw at the NFL.


This is true.


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## wmb (Dec 18, 2008)

James Long said:


> It depends on who wants it as an exclusive and how many billions of dollars they throw at the NFL.


I’m going to disagree somewhat.

I think the NFL want to retain some control over their online presence and content library. As a league, they have almost no online streaming presence. Other leagues have staked online claims. Heck, MLB Advanced Media basically invented online streaming of pro sports.

The NFL has to be looking at what’s happening in the industry, drop of satellite and cable subscribers, cord cutting/nevers, proliferation of streaming, etc. Repeat of a long term exclusive deal may bring in money near term, but there is a lesson in the current deal that they can get a bunch of money and lose market share (something that potential bidders would also be aware of). It’s hard to imagine that they don’t want a lot of flexibility to better position themselves going forward.

The exclusive will be with themselves. They will form a joint venture with a tech giant for the tech side. The NFL owners will have a stake. This will allow the joint venture to adapt to the changing marketplace and throw the billions of dollars at themselves.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

The NFL will take the best deal they can get ... if "being their own exclusive" brings in billions of dollars they will take that deal. I do not expect a renewal of the low paying DIRECTV deal. Whatever comes will be structured differently.

The current Sunday Ticket deal is not in any way a "hand the rights to DIRECTV and let them do what they want". If it was we would have immediately seen ST on Uverse and offered on stream when it was introduced. I expect the NFL's tight control of their content will continue. Especially to the point of not allowing whomever gets the rights to resell to another company (without the NFL's approval).


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

wmb said:


> I think the NFL want to retain some control over their online presence and content library. As a league, they have almost no online streaming presence. Other leagues have staked online claims. Heck, MLB Advanced Media basically invented online streaming of pro sports.


Consider how many games the MLB has as compared to the NFL.


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## Machael (Apr 20, 2008)

I've had ST as many years as it's been around. I hated the annual call to loyalty to get it at no cost. Somehow, I don't think that will be an option, with a new carrier. Bittersweet. Hated the call, but liked that they valued loyalty.


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## b4pjoe (Nov 20, 2010)

NFL Rumors: Streaming Service Under Development, Was Discussed at Owners Meetings


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

b4pjoe said:


> NFL Rumors: Streaming Service Under Development, Was Discussed at Owners Meetings


That's an angle that I haven't seen before.

I'm still betting that the League doesn't want to get their hands dirty.


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## lparsons21 (Mar 4, 2006)

harsh said:


> That's an angle that I haven't seen before.
> 
> I'm still betting that the League doesn't want to get their hands dirty.


I’m still not convinced that the League is going to get quite as big a payday out of any deal for it. We already know the Sunday Ticket package is a money loser and that has to affect any deal going forward.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

lparsons21 said:


> I’m still not convinced that the League is going to get quite as big a payday out of any deal for it. We already know the Sunday Ticket package is a money loser and that has to affect any deal going forward.


It is a money sink (mostly on AT&T's back?) the way that DIRECTV is saddled with it. That doesn't mean that someone who could reach a much larger audience couldn't print money with a similar product sold at a fraction of the price.


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

If you are interested in the story in post #239 by b4pjoe, Andrew Marchand (sports media columnist of the NY Post) said on Twitter it would be covered in this week's podcast he does with John Ourand. It is free on Apple, Spotify etc. Comes out tomorrow.


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## TheRatPatrol (Oct 1, 2003)

glrush said:


> If you are interested in the story in post #239 by b4pjoe, Andrew Marchand (sports media columnist of the NY Post) said on Twitter it would be covered in this week's podcast he does with John Ourand. It is free on Apple, Spotify etc. Comes out tomorrow.


Do you have the name of the podcast? I searched and couldn’t find it. Thanks


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## dstorm (Mar 25, 2008)

TheRatPatrol said:


> Do you have the name of the podcast? I searched and couldn’t find it. Thanks


It's called "The Marchand and Ourand Sports Media Podcast"


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## glrush (Jun 29, 2002)

TheRatPatrol said:


> Do you have the name of the podcast? I searched and couldn’t find it. Thanks


Spotify: The Marchand and Ourand Sports Media Podcast | Podcast on Spotify

Apple: The Marchand and Ourand Sports Media Podcast on Apple Podcasts


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## Curtis0620 (Apr 22, 2002)

I heard it was $5 for in-market team only on mobile device.


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## TheRatPatrol (Oct 1, 2003)

dstorm said:


> It's called "The Marchand and Ourand Sports Media Podcast"





glrush said:


> Spotify: The Marchand and Ourand Sports Media Podcast | Podcast on Spotify
> 
> Apple: The Marchand and Ourand Sports Media Podcast on Apple Podcasts


Thank you both!


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Please see Sunday Ticket … via Apple ?


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