The NFL has yet to officially announce its new round of deals for TV, but, as reported last week, Thursday Night Football will become an Amazon property. The details are still a bit vague about all TV deals, including Amazon’s, but a small amount of details was reported on Wednesday.
According to Joe Flint of the Wall Street Journal, a large chunk of TNF games would be exclusive to Amazon in its new league deal, while the NFL Network’s share in exclusive games and / or simulcast would drop to no less than five. The games broadcast by Amazon would air on local broadcast stations in the markets involved.
A deal with Amazon would result in a significant number of games on Thursday nights exclusively on its Prime Video platform and would represent the league’s deepest onslaught in streaming, some people said. These games would not be available on traditional television outside the local markets for the two teams at stake, they said.
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Amazon currently pays between $ 75 million and $ 100 million to broadcast Thursday’s games, said a person with knowledge of the business. As with Fox, that contract still has two seasons. The NFL Network would continue to play a handful of exclusive games on Saturday and Thursday, as its contract with distributors requires it to play at least five games per season, said people familiar with the league’s thinking.
You don’t even have to stretch the TNF package to get five games on the NFL Network. A Thanksgiving night game would count for one, and then the league could air four Saturday games in weeks 15 and 16. Bam: here are your five games. Last year, the NFL was launching the idea of transferring some games to Saturday, but decided to do that only if there was no college football. As you already know, there was a college football season and Saturday’s games were limited to a double game on week 15 and a triple game on week 16.
If Amazon obtains most of the TNF package exclusively, Flint reports that its annual royalty fee could increase to around $ 1 billion a year. Fox is currently paying about $ 660 million a year for TNF rights, in addition to the $ 1.1 billion it pays for its standard Sunday package. Fox, CBS and NBC are expected to pay about $ 2 billion for their new rights deals, while ESPN is increasing to between $ 2.4 and $ 2.6 billion, a percentage increase less than other networks are offering.
[Wall Street Journal]