ADVERTISEMENT

OT:NFL Sunday Ticket reportedly set to leave DirecTV for Apple TV+

Digger1

HR Heisman
Sep 30, 2001
7,588
2,370
113

NFL Sunday Ticket reportedly set to leave DirecTV for Apple TV+​

Launched in 1994, Sunday Ticket has been an underrated building block in football's evolution into America's Game. It's about to leave satellite TV for the first time.
The NFL is moving the Sunday Ticket package from DirecTV to Apple TV+ following this upcoming season, according to Matthew Belloni of PUCK.news. Belloni reports the deal is already done, but is being kept under wraps at Apple's behest.
Sunday Ticket represents an important but underrated invention in the NFL's overtaking of Major League Baseball as America's pastime. Launched in 1994, Sunday Ticket brought the NFL a new, lucrative revenue stream without creating any more inventory. The league simply brought that inventory to people previously deprived of it, thereby allowing fans to follow their hometown teams across the country -- at a time when people began re-locating for work more and more.

Sunday Ticket also turned the NFL into more of a social sport, allowing local sports bars to show all the games.
Sunday Ticket is also an important building block in DirecTV's business model. The package launched shortly after DirecTV's launch and has remained with the satellite service ever since -- until 2023.
Leaving a satellite service for a streaming company is a landmark evolution for the NFL. This fall, Amazon will take over exclusive out-of-market rights to the Thursday Night Football package.
However, Thursday night games will not be completely exclusive to Amazon; games will still air on over-the-air TV networks in each local market. It's expected the Sunday Ticket package will have a similar carve-out to avoid excluding the portions of the football-watching public that haven't quite joined us here in 2022.
Apple TV+ began airing live sports for the first time this month with MLB games. While Apple won't be airing the Sunday Ticket games, simply carrying the streams produced by Fox and CBS, it'll mark the first time Apple TV+ will be essential programming for the millions of fans that rely on Sunday Ticket to follow their out-of-market teams, their fantasy teams, and/or their betting slips.
 
I actually love this. I have never been and never will be a DirecTV customer, but I have wanted Sunday ticket for years
 
I can't believe it took them this long to figure out they could make more money by making it available to anyone, not just people with a DirectTV satellite dish.

Amazon had better work on their video streaming if they get it. Thursday Night football looks terrible.
 
THIS will hurt the bars Sunday traffic. I have DTV with the NFL package and while I enjoyed the NFL package I am glad to be moving on without the high prices of DTV. Time for something new. Also glad it is not Apple...they suck. Probably rooting for Amazon to get it since I have Prime already...we will see. I'm not confident that there is one out there that can't muck this up.
 
THIS will hurt the bars Sunday traffic. I have DTV with the NFL package and while I enjoyed the NFL package I am glad to be moving on without the high prices of DTV. Time for something new. Also glad it is not Apple...they suck. Probably rooting for Amazon to get it since I have Prime already...we will see. I'm not confident that there is one out there that can't muck this up.
Does this mean it will be a part of and included with Prime if Amazon gets it or that it’ll be available to stream via an additional cost? I assume the former as I can get NFL Ticket via apps on Roku and Samsung TV’s at a cost.
 
Apple TV just dropped $2.5 billion on ten years online exclusivity for MLS. I was already going to get it for that and was getting excited about this type of football content too.
 
I can't believe it took them this long to figure out they could make more money by making it available to anyone, not just people with a DirectTV satellite dish.

Amazon had better work on their video streaming if they get it. Thursday Night football looks terrible.
The NFL doesn't sell Sunday Ticket, they sell the rights to sell Sunday Ticket. DirecTV was simply the highest bidder and they ran Sunday Ticket at a loss to increase subscriber numbers.
 
  • Like
Reactions: rrsteffe
ADVERTISEMENT