With Apple now out, who's going to now win? Amazon and Disney are now in the bidding, thanks to their extensive streaming experience. Or will AT&T come back with a last-minute bid and keep Sunday Ticket on DirecTV?
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Reportedly Quits NFL Sunday Ticket Streaming Negotiations
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
Highest bidder that is willing to "play (better) ball" with the NFLs interests (too) will win. Who that will be is to be determined, but those 2-3 are likely in the running... maybe a dark horse or two may be out there as well.
Someone will get it and the many paying subscribers who would follow it anywhere too.
Huh? They’re changing from broadcast coverage to streaming. And raising the purchase of Sunday Ticket from $1 Billion to $2.5 Billion.
Technically, AT&T doesn't own DirectTV anymore.
At least not completely directly. (Thank goodness ... the current AT&T could mess up a bad cold. They buy something that was working and they would bungle it somehow. ) . They formed a deal with TPG capital to make DirectTV ( and Uverse TV , att video ) into a separate company. Pragmatically, AT&T still owns about 70% of that, but they don't do the day-to-day management. They may not have 70% of the 'vote' though. [ If I was TPG I sure would not want AT&T as a 'backseat driver' dictating direction. If they were so good managers they wouldn't have had to sell it. ]
DirecTV has waaaaay too much buyout debt loaded on it to spend on Sunday Ticket. Just getting rid of the craptastic AT&T 'strategies' should spur some growth.
TPG may be a 'jumping out of the frying pan into the fire' situation if they throw some vulture capital strategy at it to suck the money out.
Apple backing out doesn't make sense, and the $6.99 deal doesn't sound profitable, considering the MLS cost of an additional $14.99/mo. Why would Apple do that? Who knows, maybe they are dropping these stories to drop a perception they want to acquire to strategically land a deal covertly by throwing off the competition.
Ditto. I've read the NFL wanted $3.5 billion, and imposed a lot of restrictions and conditions. Now, Apple as a company impose a lot of these restrictions of their own (hell, it's why AT&T capitulated and released the iPhone on their network), but things like blackout dates was just some of the issues.
The NFL doesn't need Apple, and Apple doesn't need the NFL. But I postulate that the NFL would have been better off partnering with Apple vs. anyone else.
Things have been addressed by the NFL but only after it's too late for hundreds of players (not to mention 400k youth in Pop Warner) and public pressure mounted. Similar to the way Apple has opened up the App Store - slowly and begrudgingly.
The real reason Apple pulled out is because of its image being wrecked by criminal football players who Goodell slap on the wrist.
I hate it for the NFL fans, but as someone that is personally 0% into watching sports, oh well. That said, I will likely be watching soccer on the Apple TV in the future on occasion, just for fun because it will be on the Apple TV. I wish they would get NHL too... I've been to a few Nashville Predators games, and those are a blast to see in person. F1 would be a great thing too.
The people who are going to lose out are the NFL. I would argue that no other company is going to be willing to pay the 3 billion dollars a year that they want.
No. And not even after being ordered by a federal judge to do so. In America, this league has more power than anyone.
Last edited:
Do you really believe that they are going to be willing and able to pay three billion dollars a year? Amazon has already indicated that they are out,because they are already paying for the Thursday night game and not seeing the desired result.
The new owners are going to shut down the satellite service in a few years. And they are not going to expend any money improving the service. I have been a subscriber since the beginning, but this is what caused me to decide that it was time to go. I moved on to the same place they’re moving on to, streaming. This is why they didn’t want to pay for the elevated price that the NFL wants. DTV paid a billion dollars a year and everyone thought they were insane. Now the NFL wants three billion. And they just pissed off the only company who can play in those terms.
I think that Amazon is out for the reason that I stated, so it’s down to one. Guess how negotiations go, when there’s only one possible player. The NFL has F this up.
Now look, I am already a customer of all three of these companies so I am set up no matter which one wins, but Apple was going to offer me the best deal so I wanted them to win.
Sorry for the double post- my iPhone is not being today like I would expect from a company that I am spending the day defending!!
I'm glad Apple won't do it cause NFL wants the prices up. For the ones like us that don't care much about sports, I wish more live TV stuff would separate sports. The ones like Frndly and Fubo without sports are like 3-4x cheaper or better than the ones with sports in the basew packages
Personally, I'm tired of trying to chase down where a game may or may not be showing. I had hoped Apple could make that easier (big hope I know). At this point I'm done with NFL, just not worth the effort.
I don't know specifically, but I suspect it is, otherwise it wouldn't have survived for so long.
I pay for it, but after this year, who knows. I'm really not enthralled with Amazon and their Thursday night games, and anything else would probably be similar. Streaming sucks when your internet provider isn't that reliable. I have XFinity, 3 times in on game yesterday bandwidth slowed to a crawl, making the game visuals about like a stretched 10x12 screen on a 55 inch TV. Unwatchable. I much prefer watching NFL ticket on DirecTV.
I totally get it. My problem is that like many Americans I am addicted. I started watching when I was eight years old and I have never stopped in over 50 + years. I really do believe that the league has messed up very badly with this situation, Apple could have been their saving grace.
