Posted by John Vrooman on Thursday, March 3, 2016 in National Football League.

Interview with AFP (French) / Portuguese.

– Can you envision a subscription streaming platform (Netflix, Amazon) acquiring exclusive rights for a major sporting event or a league in the foreseeable future ?

Cutting the cord and streaming is the future of all media (if not the present in some cases), and this is especially true for domestic or provincial leagues seeking a more lucrative world-wide viewership.

Google is now pilot testing its fiber broadband service which should lead the competition to displace cable.

– Do you see the Yahoo/NFL experiment as something that could become the new trending model, meaning a website streaming games from a major competition or league for free ?

Yes, but the streaming revolution will take time. The commercial ad spots were a hard sell at about $100,000-$200,000 for a 30 second spot compared to $400,000 for Monday Night Football on ESPN.  

The technology and image quality was somewhat limited and pixelated but the viewership on Sunday morning for a pair of mediocre sides was still greater than for NFL Monday Night football.

– Is that streaming for free option something that can be a good way for minor sporting events or leagues to get viewership and coverage but not for bigger events or leagues ?

Free streaming is probably a good tactic if the goal is to reach a global audience for domestic leagues.

Cable sports programming is declining but not disappearing in the foreseeable future.  Over the top streaming technology and cable companies will horizontally and vertically integrate rather than compete, and joint cable broadband ventures will be the business model when the current major US sports contracts expire by 2021 and 2022.

It would not be surprising to see the NFL and the other major sports leagues to become involved in the vertical integration of the streaming of sports programming.

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