ESPN offered to carry NFL Sunday Ticket for a much lower price. NFL shot it down.

[JohnnyHammersticks]

ESPN offered to carry NFL Sunday Ticket for a significantly lower price
But the NFL shot it down

By Christopher Gates Jun 16, 2024, 10:01am CDT

Last week, we mentioned the trial that is currently taking place in Los Angeles concerning the National Football League and the NFL Sunday Ticket package that allows out-of-market fans to view their favorite team’s games every week. This week, a couple of interesting details came out that will likely frustrate those out-of-market fans and have them cheering against the NFL in this matter (for the few that weren’t already).

According to Arthur Weinstein at Awful Announcing, an e-mail was revealed in court this week that showed that ESPN had offered to carry the NFL Sunday Ticket package for $70 starting in 2023. Last season, when the package moved to YouTube TV after years spent on DirecTV, they charged over $300 for it and are offering it for $349 this season.

The e-mail also showed that ESPN was willing to offer team-specific packages, similar to what we talked about in our piece last week, but the NFL turned that down as well.

There are several other revelations that were revealed in court this past week from Weinstein’s piece, many having to do with how the NFL wanted to charge a premium price for the Sunday Ticket package and turned down other proposals that would have made it more widely accessible. I won’t crib the entire piece here, because it’s worth going to check out on your own.

The trial is expected to wrap up this week, I believe, though I don’t know when any sort of verdict or judgment will be rendered or if it will affect the way Sunday Ticket is offered for this coming season. It might be too late for this year but, with any luck, Minnesota Vikings fans (and other NFL fans) will have a bit more flexibility in their options going forward if this suit goes the way it seems to be going.

Link

[ptlyon]

Seems like a conspiracy

[Titty Meat]

Streameast is free

[JohnnyHammersticks]

720pstream is free too.

720pstream is my go-to, Streameast is my backup. Because the picture quality on 720 is a little better than Streameast imo.

Goodell and the NFL are greedy POS's. I'd gladly pay what ESPN was proposing to charge for Sunday Ticket.

[BleedingRed]

imagine paying for this stuff when the guy in Russia has sub 30 ping

[KCJake]

Originally Posted by Titty Meat

Streameast is free

I just hate when it's 5min from kickoff and there's a 40% chance of this stream working ..

[HemiEd]

Shocking that the NFL owners are greedy! Shocking I tell ya'!

[wazu]

I'm glad to hear that the streaming sites are good now. Haven't had much need for them but the few times I have it was definitely sub-par.

[lcarus]

Originally Posted by KCJake

I just hate when it's 5min from kickoff and there's a 40% chance of this stream working ..

It's about 95% for me. If it doesn't work there are 25 others that are all about the same.

[TwistedChief]

One of two things is true:

1/ They were willing to offer it at $70 (vs $300 YouTube TV) because they were bidding a fraction of what YouTube bid... in which case, who cares that they were willing to pay less than market value for something and then offer it at a below market rate?

or

2/ Whatever $70 package they were willing to offer isn't apples-to-apples comparable to the $300 YouTube TV package. There's no way ESPN is in the business of leaving that much meat on the bone.

[Rain Man]

Originally Posted by TwistedChief

One of two things is true:

1/ They were willing to offer it at $70 (vs $300 YouTube TV) because they were bidding a fraction of what YouTube bid... in which case, who cares that they were willing to pay less than market value for something and then offer it at a below market rate?

or

2/ Whatever $70 package they were willing to offer isn't apples-to-apples comparable to the $300 YouTube TV package. There's no way ESPN is in the business of leaving that much meat on the bone.

As a fan, I could really go for Option 1.

[Shiver Me Timbers]

Regardless.................

Watching the NFL on any streaming service sucks. "flipping channels" on normal cable is much more user friendly.

[Wisconsin_Chief]

This is why I have zero issue pirating the games from StreamEast. You want to rake me over the coals? Hard pass, I’ll watch it for free if you want to be greedy pigs.

[TLO]

I prefer the bear

[Wisconsin_Chief]

Originally Posted by KCJake

I just hate when it's 5min from kickoff and there's a 40% chance of this stream working ..

I dropped Sunday ticket 4 years ago and haven’t missed one second of one game. Guess it probably depends on internet connection and how you’re streaming. Using the browser on X-Box I have never had an issue.