DirectTV still owns the NFL Ticket, but....

[i_am_the_swammi]

cable subscribers will now get the "Red Zone" channel...

 

NFL, DirecTV extend deal through 2014

By BARRY WILNER, AP Football Writer

Mar 23, 8:25 pm EDT

 

Buzz up!8 votes PrintDANA POINT, Calif. (AP)—DirecTV has extended its deal with the NFL for Sunday afternoon games through 2014, an agreement worth $4 billion to the league.

 

A person familiar with the contract, who spoke anonymously because no one has been authorized to reveal the figures, told The Associated Press on Monday the deal was for $1 billion a year for four years, up from an average of $700 million per season in the previous deal.

 

That’s very good news for the NFL during the current dreary economic climate.

 

“We are pleased to extend a partnership with DirecTV that has complemented and supported our broadcast television packages for 15 years,” commissioner Roger Goodell said. “We are looking forward to having the `Red Zone’ channel on cable and other media platforms, as well as showing NFL Sunday Ticket via broadband to the homes that cannot get satellite (beginning in 2012).”

 

Under terms of the deal with the satellite carrier, the “Red Zone” channel that shows live cut-ins from all Sunday afternoon games will be available to cable TV, wireless devices and the Internet.

 

The broadband portion of the new contract is significant because many areas, particularly apartment buildings or residences surrounded by trees, can’t get a satellite signal.

 

Also extended was DirecTV’s agreement to carry NFL Network.

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

I wish they'd let the cable companies into the loop.

[Menudo]

If I'm able to get the full version of the Red Zone channel on NFL network or something like that, bye-bye Sunday Ticket.

 

I essentially watch the Steelers when there on (of course) and redzone channel when they're not. Red Zone channel is awesome. If it is available to me without the ticket, I will definitely cancel and save some $$$.

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

I wish they'd allow the cable companies to sell a limited ticket package...that is pick your team and you get all their games. I'd probably pay up to something like $99 for that probably.

[i_am_the_swammi]

I wish they'd let the cable companies into the loop.

 

Not only are they not letting them into the loop, but Comcast will likely not be carrying the NFL Network this season...I had a message about this yesterday on my converter box:

 

It also looks like another sign that NFL Network will disappear from Comcast Cable altogether when that contract expires May 1. It is currently part of the sports tier that costs an extra $5 a month, but Derek Baine, an analyst for research firm SNL Kagan, recently wrote that Comcast was considering dropping its sports tier and folding some channels into digital basic. On Monday, CableFAX Daily wrote that Comcast has begun to notify subscribers that they could lose the NFL Network.

[McBoog]

The funny thing is that EVERY time a cable company or other dish company tries to get you to switch and you askk them if they have the ticket, they ALWAYS answer, "Probably next year." I guess that you can tell 'em, "Make that a fiver!"

 

Look, this is available to whichever company is willing to pay the bucks and Direct TV ponies up. All the wishing in the world ain't gonna change that. The limited stuff they are talking about for cable is going to cost YOU almost as much as what DTV customers get.

[HowboutthemCowboys]

Not only are they not letting them into the loop, but Comcast will likely not be carrying the NFL Network this season...I had a message about this yesterday on my converter box:

 

It also looks like another sign that NFL Network will disappear from Comcast Cable altogether when that contract expires May 1. It is currently part of the sports tier that costs an extra $5 a month, but Derek Baine, an analyst for research firm SNL Kagan, recently wrote that Comcast was considering dropping its sports tier and folding some channels into digital basic. On Monday, CableFAX Daily wrote that Comcast has begun to notify subscribers that they could lose the NFL Network.

 

FU Comcast!

[rajncajn]

I wish they'd let the cable companies into the loop.

I wish they would let you purchase team packages rather than the whole Sunday Ticket.

[Randall]

I keep telling cable(Charter) I'd get them if they had NFLN but they never do it.

[darin3]

Y'all are missing one important caveat here:

 

We are looking forward to having the `Red Zone’ channel on cable and other media platforms, as well as showing NFL Sunday Ticket via broadband to the homes that cannot get satellite

 

Uh, just about every home can get satellite. This is going to affect a small few if in fact they stick to their guns on this factoid.

[Outshined]

cable subscribers will now get the "Red Zone" channel...

 

NFL, DirecTV extend deal through 2014

By BARRY WILNER, AP Football Writer

Mar 23, 8:25 pm EDT

 

Buzz up!8 votes PrintDANA POINT, Calif. (AP)—DirecTV has extended its deal with the NFL for Sunday afternoon games through 2014, an agreement worth $4 billion to the league.

 

A person familiar with the contract, who spoke anonymously because no one has been authorized to reveal the figures, told The Associated Press on Monday the deal was for $1 billion a year for four years, up from an average of $700 million per season in the previous deal.

 

That's very good news for the NFL during the current dreary economic climate.

 

"We are pleased to extend a partnership with DirecTV that has complemented and supported our broadcast television packages for 15 years," commissioner Roger Goodell said. "We are looking forward to having the `Red Zone' channel on cable and other media platforms, as well as showing NFL Sunday Ticket via broadband to the homes that cannot get satellite (beginning in 2012)."

 

Under terms of the deal with the satellite carrier, the "Red Zone" channel that shows live cut-ins from all Sunday afternoon games will be available to cable TV, wireless devices and the Internet.

 

The broadband portion of the new contract is significant because many areas, particularly apartment buildings or residences surrounded by trees, when it is fricken snowing or thurnderstorming can't get a satellite signal.

 

Also extended was DirecTV's agreement to carry NFL Network.

[budlitebrad]

Cable wary of NFL’s Red Zone Channel

By JOHN OURAND Staff writer

Published April 06, 2009 : Page 01

 

The president from one of the country’s biggest cable operators approached a reporter last week and retold a joke that he said was making the rounds at the cable industry’s annual convention in Washington, D.C.

 

Question: What’s the best way for DirecTV to market its exclusive NFL Sunday Ticket service?

 

Answer: The Red Zone Channel.

 

The joke speaks volumes about the state of the NFL’s relationship with the cable industry — a relationship that has become so bad that the league’s cable offerings are now a punch line.

 

The joke also offers the first glimpse at how cable distributors view the NFL’s proposed Red Zone Channel, a new network the league is trying to sell to cable that provides live look-ins and real-time highlights during NFL games.

 

Cable still doesn’t know much about the proposed channel, but it is nearly unanimously leery about carrying it.

 

Last week’s Cable Show was the first time the cable industry gathered en masse since the NFL announced its $4 billion Sunday Ticket extension with DirecTV on March 23. Cable’s overwhelming response to the deal, which keeps the popular Sunday Ticket service on cable’s biggest competitor through the 2014 season, was filled with a mixture of resignation and confusion.

 

The Red Zone Channel, announced as part of the Sunday Ticket renewal with DirecTV, would offer live look-ins on Sunday afternoon NFL action. When it announced its Sunday Ticket deal, the NFL said it would make the Red Zone Channel available to cable operators as a stand-alone channel. Sort of a “Sunday Ticket Lite” offering, the channel would provide live look-ins and real-time highlights to the league’s Sunday afternoon games. It would be sold to cable operators as a separate channel from NFL Network.

 

NFL executives are hoping to use the Red Zone Channel to entice cable operators to start carrying NFL Network.

 

“We want both fan-friendly services available as widely as possible,” an NFL Network spokesperson said.

 

One problem, however, is that cable operators still don’t know anything about the Red Zone Channel. They don’t know how much it will cost. They don’t know what it will look like. They don’t know how the NFL plans to schedule the channel, or even if it will exist outside of football Sundays.

 

An NFL spokesperson said these questions will be answered over the next few weeks, as league executives meet with cable, satellite and telephone companies.

 

But cable’s initial pessimism about the proposed channel is not good news for NFL Network, which is facing the loss of about 2 million subscribers after its Comcast deal expires at the end of the month.

 

Most of the cable operator executives contacted by SportsBusiness Journal last week worried that the proposed channel would become a marketing vehicle for DirecTV’s service. Why just get the Red Zone Channel when you can get the entire Sunday Ticket service on DirecTV?

 

“It’s an interesting idea,” said Comcast Executive Vice President David Cohen. “But I don’t think that it’s a fully baked idea. And we certainly don’t know or understand exactly what the NFL wants to do with it.”

 

But cable’s animus with the league goes beyond the Red Zone Channel. Cable executives are upset that the league continues to sell its popular out-of-market package exclusively to DirecTV, especially when every other league sells its out-of-market package to both cable and satellite.

 

It’s one reason why more than one high-ranking cable exec described NFL relations — which have not been particularly good for years — as being at an all-time low.

 

“It’s unfortunate that this issue with the NFL Network has been taken to the level it’s been taken to,” said Bob Wilson, senior vice president of programming for Cox, one of the few big cable operators to have a deal with NFL Network.

 

Others aren’t shy about saying the lack of access to Sunday Ticket makes a deal for NFL Network less likely. “Our members aren’t happy about it,” said Matt Polka, president of the American Cable Association, a group of small and medium-size cable operators. “They’d like access to that programming.”

 

Comcast’s Cohen said that Comcast “made it crystal clear” to the NFL that it was interested in bidding for the package on a nonexclusive basis, but was rebuffed.

 

“They have made it quite clear in every conversation where we have brought this up that we should stop focusing on their out-of-market package because they’re not going to make it available to cable,” he said.

[Suture]

Good news on the Red Zone channel. I'm finally giving up my DirecTV this month for cable. I'm just sick of the issues I've had with it, both technical and billing. I will miss the NFL Sunday Ticket, but after all the crap I had last year (games suddenly being blacked out with one quarter to go, some not coming in HD, etc.), I won't be too sad. I'll just go to the bar more often I guess.

[Square]

I wish they'd allow the cable companies to sell a limited ticket package...that is pick your team and you get all their games. I'd probably pay up to something like $99 for that probably.

 

 

I wish they would let you purchase team packages rather than the whole Sunday Ticket.

 

This would be awesome. I know many of you live in home town areas of games, but I really don't. They give me the KC game most weeks. How awful is that? I don't even live in the same state but since I'm only 3 hours away, they include me. So since I'm not a chiefs fan I get 3 to 4 random games a week. If I could get all the home and away games of one team I select for 50-100 bones, that would be a done deal. I'd even be closer to considering direct TV if I didn't have to purchase the whole $300 - $400 package just to get the game I actually want. I don't have time to watch 14 games in a weekend. I'd just like to be able to see the one I want. Why is that so hard?

[Jrick35]

This would be awesome. I know many of you live in home town areas of games, but I really don't. They give me the KC game most weeks. How awful is that? I don't even live in the same state but since I'm only 3 hours away, they include me. So since I'm not a chiefs fan I get 3 to 4 random games a week. If I could get all the home and away games of one team I select for 50-100 bones, that would be a done deal. I'd even be closer to considering direct TV if I didn't have to purchase the whole $300 - $400 package just to get the game I actually want. I don't have time to watch 14 games in a weekend. I'd just like to be able to see the one I want. Why is that so hard?

 

I am sure they are asking themselves something like this...

 

Of the current number of people who get the Full Sunday Ticket, how many of them would reduce from the full ticket to a team specific ticket?

 

If a team specific ticket was 1/4th the cost of the full ticket, then for every subscriber who did move from the full ticket to a team specific package they would have to sign up 3 additional team specific subscribers, just to break even on their current customer base.

 

Then they have to compare that to how many new team specific subscribers they think they could add to see if it would be cost effective.

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

How many people are dropping the Ticket because of cutting costs in this economy? Maybe the team specific package would retain quite a few of those customers who might otherwise drop.

Edited April 6, 2009 by CaP'N GRuNGe

[Jrick35]

How many people are dropping the Ticket because of cutting costs in this economy? Maybe the team specific package would retain quite a few of those customers who might otherwise drop.

 

Good point, I would like to see a retention number.

[Seahawks21]

If I'm able to get the full version of the Red Zone channel on NFL network or something like that, bye-bye Sunday Ticket.

 

I essentially watch the Steelers when there on (of course) and redzone channel when they're not. Red Zone channel is awesome. If it is available to me without the ticket, I will definitely cancel and save some $$$.

I second that. I was so pumped when I saw that we might get the red-zone channel! I spend 75% of my non-Seahawk time on that channel as well.

[justin]

Y'all are missing one important caveat here:

 

Uh, just about every home can get satellite. This is going to affect a small few if in fact they stick to their guns on this factoid.

 

Many homes / apartments in areas with tall buildings can't. It could afftect millions in large cities.

I currently can't get it (although I've tried on multiple occasions).

[westhemess2]

http://www.philly.com/philly/business/2009...work_fight.html

 

it continues..