The start of another NFL season is upon us, and now more than ever there exists a plethora of ways to watch each game on Sunday. NFL Sunday Ticket, one of the more well known options, returns for its 25th year[1]. With streaming options extremely limited for much of the service’s lifespan, NFL Sunday Ticket was one of the few ways NFL superfans could catch every game from September through January. It’s 2018 now, though, and the NFL Sunday Ticket package that DirecTV provides is quickly becoming obsolete.

As Ben Koo points out in a post for Awful Announcing[2], purchasing NFL Sunday Ticket makes very little sense in this day and age. Koo strongly believes that, “it’s a product that hasn’t aged well over time and is in many ways outdated given today’s media options.” Koo goes on to present multiple reasons as to why Sunday Ticket isn’t worth the $300-400 investment anymore. Among his gripes:

• approximately 90 million households with TVs in the US aren’t eligible to even purchase the package
• the price point for Sunday Ticket has steadily increased over the past six years; it was $100 cheaper in 2012[3]
• compared to leagues like the NBA and MLB, DirecTV charges upwards of $200-300 more for much less content

As an avid NFL fan, I completely agree with the argument that Koo makes. Unlike the other major North American sports leagues, the NFL and DirecTV have yet to even create a subscription service that allows fans to follow just their favorite teams, let alone a service that’s both innovative and cost-effective. I’m not against paying for content as long as it’s worth my while, but why would I shell out a few hundred dollars when I can simply go to Reddit and find a full 1080p stream of any NFL game[4] for free each Sunday? To its credit, NFL Sunday Ticket was a groundbreaking idea and for years provided fans with a solid streaming option at a great value. Sadly, in 2018, that’s no longer the case.

References

1. NFL SUNDAY TICKET | Watch NFL Games | DIRECTV Official Site. (n.d.). Retrieved September 16, 2018, from https://www.directv.com/sports/nfl

2. Koo, B. (2018, September 13). NFL Sunday Ticket is absurdly overpriced, illogically packaged, and pushes fans away from the league. Retrieved September 16, 2018, from http://awfulannouncing.com/nfl/nfl-sunday-ticket-is-absurdly-overpriced-illogically-packaged-and-pushes-fans-away-from-the-league.html

3. Lawler, R. (2012, April 19). DirecTV drops NFL Sunday Ticket price for current subscribers. Retrieved September 16, 2018, from https://www.engadget.com/2012/04/19/directv-drops-nfl-sunday-ticket-price-for-current-subscribers/

4. R/nflstreams. (n.d.). Retrieved September 16, 2018, from https://www.reddit.com/r/nflstreams/