Sure, we’ve had sports streaming for years, with Disney’s ESPN+ steadily gaining subscribers. But this new venture is like the Hulu of sports, with the might of three media conglomerates getting behind it. It’s going to advance things greatly, assuming all the regulatory hurdles can be cleared along the way. Sports rights have helped to prop up cable and TV channels for years. What happens when people can ditch cable and opt-in for this instead? The writing is on the wall.
Good or bad, this is what needs to happen for these companies to survive in the long term. They’ve made streaming the future and they can’t go back to TV as it used to exist. Streaming, as it happens, is also not profitable for pretty much anyone but Netflix. That means these companies must innovate and find ways to increase streaming revenue before it’s too late. So here we are. Sports fans will be asked to shell out anywhere between $40 and $50 a month (the expected price for the service), which will undoubtedly cause many of them to bail on cable. No, it won’t be all sports in one place (NBCU and CBS are sitting this whole thing out), but an awful lot of games will be covered by this new streamer.
NFL Sunday Ticket went to YouTube last year and upended DirecTV’s business model. Netflix just shelled out a fortune for the rights to stream WWE’s “Raw.” Sports streaming rights are a hot-ticket item right now, and it was the last card that old-school TV had to play. Disney, Fox, and WB would surely love to keep the money from their legacy TV businesses rolling in for years to come, but that’s no longer possible. The future they foisted upon us is calling.
I spoke more about this on today’s episode of the /Film Daily podcast, which you can listen to below:
You can subscribe to /Film Daily on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts, and send your feedback, questions, comments, concerns, and mailbag topics to us at bpearson@slashfilm.com. Please leave your name and general geographic location in case we mention your e-mail on the air.
The Disney, WB, Fox Sports Streaming App Is Coming To Finally Kill Traditional TV Forever
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