The National Football League has finalized its new 11-year media rights agreement with a pact that will run through 2033 and could be worth over US$100 billion, reported Bloomberg.
The league announced Thursday, March 18, it’s renewing TV rights with all of its existing broadcast partners and adding Amazon Prime Video as an exclusive partner for its Thursday Night Football package. It’s the first time a streaming service will carry a full package of games exclusively. Amazon is paying about US$1 billion per year, according to people familiar with the matter. Amazon’s deal runs 10 years and begins in 2023.
ViacomCBS, Fox, and Comcast (which owns NBCUniversal) are all paying more than US$2 billion per year for their 11-year-long packages, while Disney (which owns ESPN and ABC) will pay around US$2.7 billion annually, according to people familiar with the matter. Using these numbers, the NFL’s new agreement projects to be more than US$100 billion — the richest US sports league media deal.
ViacomCBS is paying US$2.1 billion for its package and NBCUniversal is paying about US$2 billion, the lowest of any of the partners, but the highest increase over its previous deal, the people said. NBCUniversal paid US$1.1 billion for its previous package, including playoff games.
Fox is also projected to pay over US$2 billion in its new contact, but will save US$660 million as it relinquishes the Thursday Night Football package. Morgan Stanley estimates that contact will be averaging US$400 million in annual losses in 2023 when Fox’s agreement expires.
Disney is paying more and receiving more NFL content, including rights to exclusively air an international game each year, beginning in 2022, one of the people said. In this pact, the ESPN network keeps the Monday Night Football package and also has rights to air two Super Bowls on its ABC network. Disney can stream all NFL games that air on ABC and ESPN on ESPN+, the league stated.
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