Roger Goodell, the NFL commissioner, has dealt a blow to streaming service Peacock by admitting it's "certainly" not going to have Super Bowl rights anytime soon.
This comes after Peacock made history by hosting the first exclusively digital playoff game this season. The wild-card round of the playoffs saw fans needing a Peacock subscription to watch the Kansas City Chiefs host the Miami Dolphins.
The streaming service paid £87.1 million for the rights to the game, marking the first time a postseason game has been behind a digital paywall. Goodell discussed the shift from cable to digital at the Super Bowl Opening Night at Allegiant Stadium.
He acknowledged that while further changes to NFL game distribution are expected, the Super Bowl won't be affected for now. He praised the success of NFL ratings on Peacock and Amazon Prime, saying: "This year showed that our fans are on these platforms. For us, it's part of the future. We have to fish where the fish are... It reduced our average viewer age by 10 years."
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However, when asked if a streaming platform could ever exclusively broadcast the Super Bowl, he said: "Certainly not in my time at least." This comes as sports coverage continues to move to digital platforms, with Netflix recently announcing a partnership with WWE.
From 2025, the online service will be the sole rights holder of "WWE Raw," marking its departure from regular channels. Even Major League Soccer has taken the same route, with Apple TV now holding the rights.
Thursday Night Football already streams on Amazon Prime, and a new 10-year agreement was made before the 2023 season kicked off. Amazon is reportedly dishing out close to £100 billion for their rights, a hefty amount considering they only air one live game each week.
But they're not alone in this race. Peacock has gatecrashed with £87.1m spent on one playoff game, showing they mean business. As a part of NBC, which already airs Sunday Night Football, it is believed they'll chase more rights in the future.
However, this exclusive playoff match denied many fans the chance to watch the action unless they agreed to pay the monthly $5.99 (£4.75) to sign up. While local channels still showed the game, those outside of Kansas or South Florida had to subscribe to Peacock to watch.
Goodell didn't reveal much about streaming's future with NFL, but a shift in the sports industry as a whole is evident. This year, everyone can watch the Super Bowl on CBS.
* An AI tool was used to add an extra layer to the editing process for this story.
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