According to a 2021 U.S. Subscription TV Forecast report from Strategy Analytics, U.S. viewers will spend more on streaming video than pay TV for the first time in 2024. Based on the trends we’re beginning to see with this year’s fall sports season, it seems like live sporting events may be leading the charge.
Last week’s Amazon premiere of Thursday Night Football, featuring starting heavyweight quarterbacks Tom Brady and Patrick Mahomes, proved to be a rating success, drawing 15.3M viewers in its first week. Amazon’s attention to detail with their 29 cameras, two sky cams (a la the Super Bowl), and chipped uniforms for next-gen stats increased sports fan expectations around the world. According to a memo sent to Amazon’s staff, Jay Marine, Amazon’s global head of sports, stated that the broadcast gave Amazon its largest window of U.S. Prime sign-ups ever, exceeding Prime Day, Cyber Monday, and Black Friday.
But Amazon’s not the only one with an eye toward sports streaming. Just this week, the NBA and Microsoft made headlines with their announcement of a new, immersive, personalized app experience inclusive of a full programming plan, AI-powered data (fantasy fans, rejoice!), and “CrunchTime,” the NBA’s version of the NFL’s RedZone. This partnership allows Microsoft to claim a foothold in the live streaming business, and sports is a logical place to start. We suspect this is just the beginning of a full omnichannel strategy for the NBA, inclusive of rewards, merchandise, and of course, NFTs.
Another partnership worth noting here is AppleTV+ and Major League Baseball. The pre-season agreement gives Apple’s streaming service exclusive rights to some of MLB’s Friday night games. Although access to the stream is free, it has gained some criticism as many older fans (and paying cable subscribers!) looking to watch Aaron Judge break Roger Maris’ home run record in The Bronx, may not have access to the content. It’s an interesting conundrum where the league is working hard to support the younger cord-cutting generation, but many older audiences still have cable and more traditional viewing expectations. To make matters more interesting, Sinclair’s recent launch of Bally Sports+ gives localized gaming access to specific regions. Currently, in five markets, they plan to quickly expand into 19 other regions. It seems the MLB is still working to sort out their strategy here, so watch this space.
As the streaming wars continue to shape up, sports streaming is definitely a key trend to watch and seems to be delivering most of the audiences. As this continues to evolve (and change!), we expect to see many more regional and niche sports continuing to explore this vehicle to connect directly with their fans. Pickleball, anyone?