Wow, this could be a big dent to this lucrative partnership. Google, DirecTV, and the NFL are getting sued by a class action lawsuit of residential and commercial parties over the trio’s supposed conspiracy to push NFL games behind the NFL Sunday Ticket paywall and boost its revenues.
I’m not really sure what will come of this lawsuit, but it’s definitely a serious risk to the parties.
Google, DirecTV, and the NFL are all under fire and facing a massive lawsuit from a class action of dissatisfied residential and commercial parties as the $6B lawsuit claims the NFL, DirecTV, and Google (who will be the new owner of Sunday Ticket) have hatched a conspiracy to artificially inflate NFL Sunday Ticket’s, the league’s streaming service for out-of-market games, subscriptions and revenue streams by forcing out-of-market games behind its paywall. And, unless I’m missing something, that’s exactly what the NFL is doing…and it’s not illegal in the slightest.
Now, just to clarify before we get into the meat and bones of this situation, Google isn’t a technically a party in the $6B class-action lawsuit as they are not the part owners of NFL Sunday Ticket until the NFL-DirecTV partnership expires after the 2030 season, yet they are being sued by these plaintiffs for stats like subscriber growth, retail prices, and rights fees to support their claims that the NFL imposed restrictions on DirecTV for what games could be televised.
Nevertheless, as I wrote a second ago, I really don’t understand this lawsuit in the slightest. To the best of my understanding, these plaintiffs, which consist of businesses, private citizens, etc., are suing the NFL and DirecTV for $6B in damages because they couldn’t watch out-of-market games on T.V.? Is that really their complaint?
Perhaps I’m too conditioned by the NFL’s and the cable stations business practices, but all televised games have always been games that are in your local area (ex: if you live in Cleveland, you watch Clevland Browns games every week on one of the major stations) and one out-of-state game hosted by another major station.
And, after the standard 1PM ET time slot for all football games has been played, the 4:25 PM ET primetime games between any host of NFL teams is broadcasted before the 8 PM ET primetime game between any host of NFL teams caps off the night. All other games are either available through streaming services, such as NFL Sunday Ticket, or you have to live in another area of the United States to watch that team play.
That’s how it’s been for at least the last twenty years (the time I’ve been alive) if not longer…with the subscription service options obviously being a much more recent addition.
I understand that it’s not fun to have to pay hundreds of dollars a year to buy the NFL Sunday Ticket subscription service to watch your favorite out-of-market team, but the league surely has the right to sign any exclusive subscription service agreement it wishes with any company it wishes to broadcast their own services.
Unlike the NFL’s agreement with Electronic Arts to only have that company develop NFL games which shouldn’t be legal (in my humble opinion) as the Madden games are STRICTLY EA-OWNED games and the NFL has no broadcasting stake in their distribution (they are only allowing EA to replicate their players and team’s likeness…which should be an option for any gaming company that can afford the licensing agreement with the NFL), the NFL has a divested stake in the distribution/broadcasting of their games on NFL Sunday Ticket.
As, well, it is THEIR PRODUCT (unlike the Madden games).
Hell, they even OWN a percentage of the platform…which completely nullifies the “damages” and “conspiracy” claims this lawsuit is presenting. The NFL could set the price of NFL Sunday Ticket to $1M/month if they so wished as IT’S THEIR PRODUCT and their IP!
Still, that DOESN’T mean we HAVE TO BUY it as we can easily boycott the league if such a decision as that was ever made, and they’d be forced to lower the prices over night. That’s how a free market works and claiming $6B in damages just because you as a Connecticut-born Cowboys fan can’t watch the Cowboys play every week is a pathetic excuse for a money grab from the NFL in my opinion.
Whether you like it or not, the NFL has the sole rights to their marketing and broadcasting of their league and can set prices for such rights/agreements at however high they wish. So, in an extremely rare turn of events these days, I’m actually siding with the NFL and its megalithic corporation on this one.
This really is a strange world.
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