As major sports leagues continue to move away from cable to streaming services, certain games like primetime games, holiday games and the playoffs are becoming streamed exclusively, making fans pay for that streaming platform’s subscription. Fans are being left behind due to the rising costs of multiple subscriptions needed to watch their favorite teams, primetime games and more. To address this issue and make it easier and more affordable for fans to watch out-of-market teams, single-team streaming packages should be offered, allowing fans to watch their team without restrictions.
As a dedicated football fan, watching my favorite team, Go Broncos, has been a weekend pastime for me since my elementary school days. Growing up with cable, I was barely able to watch my favorite team since they were out-of-market and settled with watching the in-market Los Angeles teams that were streamed on the local channels.
While fans have put up with this issue for some time, the introduction of single-team streaming packages would offer greater customization for fans and potentially generate more revenue for the National Football League (NFL). Despite the availability of various streaming services and packages, the NFL remains one of the few major sports leagues that does not offer a single-team streaming option, unlike the National Basketball Association (NBA) and Major League Baseball (MLB).
In recent years, the NFL has started to place some regular season and playoff games exclusively on streaming services along with a subscription. Their first attempt came in the 2023 season when the Chiefs versus Dolphins playoff game was exclusively on Peacock TV with a $5.99 subscription price attached. Though unpopular with fans, the game boasted 23 million views with NBC gaining $100 million from the game alone. In the same year, Prime Video became the exclusive broadcaster of Thursday Night Football in a deal that cost the streaming service one billion each year.
Following these successful deals, the NFL has aired two Christmas day games on Netflix and an ESPN only Monday Night Football, signaling a future where previously accessible national televised games become increasingly locked behind paywalls. This begs the question if, one day in the not-so-distant future, the Super Bowl itself could be locked behind a subscription. While the commissioner of the NFL has denied this ever happening, it wasn’t long ago that having playoff games exclusively streamed seemed far-fetched.
For fans who do not use cable, there are an overwhelming number of options available, but none of them offer a straightforward solution for watching out-of-market games. For example, there are various options like Hulu Live, Spectrum and Sling TV that essentially replace cable, but those will only provide local games and nationally broadcast games.
There’s also the NFL’s own streaming service, NFL+. This doesn’t even include subscriptions to exclusive streamed games like Prime Video or ESPN+.
Finally, while there is an option to watch all out-of-market games, NFL Sunday Ticket, it’s unaffordable for many at $479. It’s unreasonable to believe that a fan will spend hundreds of dollars for all of these subscriptions. The dizzying amount of streaming services to pick and buy has left fans confused and annoyed as they try to navigate and manage the increasingly complicated nature of watching a simple football game.
“I feel like [the exclusivity] is really a hassle for the average day fan or maybe an older fan,” senior Justin Ray said.
Streaming platforms for live sports are not going away anytime soon, nor should they, but to make watching out-of-market games easier, the major sports leagues should offer team-specific watching packages. These packages would be cheaper than the $479 price tag since it would only include one team. This solution isn’t perfect by any means as fans may have more than one team they want to watch and have to pay for, but for those who mainly want to see their favorite team play, single-team streaming packages are perfect to cut down on costs for games they’re not interested in.
“I feel like with the solo memberships, if they could guarantee that they could still watch the Super Bowl even if your team didn’t make it, that’d be cool,” Ray said.
As cable TV gives way to convenient, on-the-go streaming, it’s natural for live sports to partner with streaming services to maximize viewership and revenue. However, for fans whose teams aren’t local, not being able to watch games live is frustrating and diminishes the experience. Part of supporting a team is watching key moments unfold in real time, with all the emotions that come with it. The NFL, already raking in billions, is now squeezing fans for every last dollar, turning a beloved game into a money grab.
Having to spend money to watch games is inevitable, but if I have to purchase multiple subscriptions to watch my team’s games, I rather spend money on one purchase that gives me access to a specific team along with access to the playoffs and Super Bowl. Paying for multiple subscriptions adds up over time to watch one game on the platform that my team is playing on. The NFL should consider listening to their fans and make football watching simple again by adding an affordable single-team subscription so all fans can enjoy rooting for their team.
