Netflix of Sports Hasn’t Arrived But …

In the five years since Ed wrote “Handicapping the Netflix of sports” (SBJ, 3/2/28/1/16), streaming has boomed: Disney+, HBO Max and Apple TV+ have joined Netflix and Amazon and “over-the-top” is now materially affecting traditional cable. As predicted for sports, BAM and Disney combined to launch ESPN+; Amazon bought NFL and EPL rights; and new sports-only streamers launched, including FloSports and DAZN. However, a single “Netflix of sports” has not emerged. In fact, we now anticipate there will not be one sports aggregator. Therefore, every property must now rethink its key source of non-gate revenue and exposure.

Based on incumbent rights, the legacy networks remain kings of live major U.S. sports — for the time being. Now they are buying streaming rights in combination with linear — spreading package content (and cost) across their platforms (e.g., ESPN/ESPN+ [SEC and UFC], NBC/Peacock [EPL]). These deals permit the leagues to stay with proven entities they know and trust (which still need and can pay for their product) while hedging the properties’ and networks’ future bets.

As we look forward:

■ Expect one more mostly traditional rights cycle, led by even-richer NFL agreements. But sports networks will continue to bifurcate content across multiple platforms, serving viewer groups differently: older ones via linear large screens, and younger ones on their smaller streaming handhelds.

■ Sports combined with entertainment will also make sense for multi-product…