Sports Transition to Streaming Brings Linear Reckoning Closer

By Chris Kelly, CEO Upwave

It is impossible to understate how important sports have been to linear.

Yet, broadcasters acknowledge these sports crown jewels are inevitably moving to streaming platforms–either their own platforms or alternatives owned by their “Big Tech” competitors.

Monday Night Football (ESPN) and Sunday Night Football (NBC) have been the most watched programs in broadcast for several years, and the Oscars was the only non-sports program to crack the top 20 of most watched individual “episodes” from last year. Ninety-five percent of that list is the NFL! That’s domination of the medium.

But, in 2024, Netflix is broadcasting a Christmas Day doubleheader, part of a multi-year deal valuing each game at about $75 million. Amazon Prime continues to own Thursday Night Football. Peacock broadcasts several sports, including College Football and the English Premier League. It also created the “Gold Zone” for this year’s Olympics, which allowed viewers to watch one channel where the coverage would shift from sport to sport.  The NBA replaced long-term partner TNT with Amazon Prime as the third pole alongside NBC and ESPN in its future broadcasting strategy.

Then, in May, Disney, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery announced an unprecedented partnership and the launch of Venu Sports, shattering any illusion that the war was between traditional broadcasters and streamers. It’s now a demarcation between those who understand streaming is the future and those who don’t. While Venu’s launch is currently tied up in litigation, the march towards making sports streaming-first continues.

Why is this massive shift happening?

First, leagues no longer have to resort to networks to get eyeballs. Anywhere from 88% to 99% of US households subscribe to at least one streaming service, meaning leagues can depend on a substantial audience. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said, in a statement, “Prime Video’s massive subscriber base will dramatically expand our ability to reach our fans in new and innovative ways.”

Hans Schroeder, executive vice president and COO of NFL Media, told Yahoo Finance, “Streaming is clearly continuing to grow, and I think that’ll be a bigger and bigger part of our future as we look forward.”

Second, the leagues also are intrigued by the potential for larger budgets and advanced technology capabilities that streaming partners can provide. Veteran broadcaster Al Michaels told Sports Business Journal that “two NBA owners called him and told him that Amazon’s game and studio production of ‘TNF’ was a factor in their intention to move to Prime Video from TNT.

So, what happens to linear?

Emarketer predicts that CTV advertising will eclipse linear spend sometime in 2029. I believe that’s not fully accounting for this rapid migration of sports.

I predict the inflection point will likely occur earlier than expected, probably in 2027. Sports will be thought of as a streaming experience, not a linear one. To a young generation of cord-never fans, that distinction is already archaic.

Should advertisers care?

This is good for advertisers who are investing heavily in CTV, some of whom are only interested in linear for sports. CTV, of course, offers advertisers the best of both worlds from linear TV and digital: immersive storytelling on the biggest screen in the house, with precision targeting and measurement.

More sports on CTV gives advertisers more opportunities to efficiently reach their audiences and demonstrate outcomes for their campaigns—as most outcomes are generally easier to measure on digital mediums than on linear.

This shift is not only beneficial for advertisers, though. It’s good for leagues who can work with the streaming platforms to develop new, innovative ways to broadcast the content, which viewers could choose their preference. Besides the Peacock Gold stream, Amazon has experimented with alternative TNF broadcasts with Lebron James and one focused on next-gen stats.

It will be good for media companies that win and maintain their sports rights and embrace the positives of streaming.

Some have argued this shift is a mixed-bag for consumers, who over the years moved from needing bunny ears to watch all NFL Games, to a cable subscription, to now up to five streaming services.  I’ll save that debate for another day.

In the meantime, I have some football to stream.