DirecTV / NFL Sunday Ticket

[spaldao]

Its fantastic. I couldn't of lived without it when I lived in NM

[TD Riggo]

Does anyone have any insight as to how DirecTV manages to monopolize NFL Sunday Ticket?

Certainly companies like Time-Warner, or Cox Cable (say nothing of the huge telephone companies like Verizon and AT&T who are now entering the TV arena) have the ability to offer ridiculous money to carry NFL Sunday Ticket. So I'm left wondering how a comparatively small company like DirecTV gets away with an exclusive contract with the NFL.

I'm hopeful that because they're providing cable TV through a modem (and in Verizon's case an entirely proprietary fibre-optic network) that companies like Verizon or AT&T will not be technically classified as "Cable TV" companies. The thought being that they'd fall outside of DirecTV's exclusive agreement.

Surely the NFL (or whomever controls NFL Sunday Ticket) realizes that their subscription rate would grow exponentially if they allowed all cable TV providers the opportunity to broadcast their NFL package.

First, DirecTV is not "small," by ANY means! They are now owned by News Corp, owner of FOX and Fox News. They have a LOT of moolah. They bid a fortune for exclusive rights to NFL-ST, and they won. So, for the foreseeable future, DirecTV, the original sole-provider for Sunday Ticket, will continue to be sole provider of NFL-ST.

As it should be ..

[RedskinsFanInTX]

All of the games are in HD id you have the HDTV televison and HD directv reciever. It's great.

[Gizzle]

I'm moving into a new place within the next week up here in Western mass (from MD) and a deciding factor in the place will definately be if I can get directv solely for the nfl ticket. That and they need to allow pit bulls, but mainly the NFL Ticket!

[TD Riggo]

Sunday Ticket is a very nice package, which I would buy in a heartbeat were it available on something else than DirecTV. I've had DirecTV (5-6 years ago) and didn't like it. Too many service interruptions due to weather anomalies, etc.

Rad,

I also live in central Florida and aside from a few heavy-duty Summer thunderheads which block the signal for up to a minute or two, I never have extended interruptions due to "weather anomalies." Seeing how I watch very little TV during the Summer, it's a non-starter for me. Heck, I even had some friends over to watch a PPV movie back in 1999 when the huge Hurricane Floyd was 50 miles off shore (I'm 40 miles from the Atlantic) and we watched the whole thing right off the sat with less than 5 minutes of outages.

Contrast this with my former cable company (that I ditched back in 1995) .. then Time Warner, now "Brighthouse" .. whose consistently horrible picture quality (PQ) and even worse "service" who kept blaming my new big screen TV as the culprit. When I made the switch, the PQ of DirecTV blew me away (on that very television that they said was the problem), and still does today. Plus, my other reason for switching was NFL-ST of which I've been a subscriber since 1995. I haven't missed a Redskins game since.

I'll take the occasional Summer outage which never lasts more than a minute or two, and usually takes place during the daylight hours when Summer storms are occurring anyway, over any cable company ANY day! Plus, they'll NEVER have NFL-ST, because DirecTV will outbid anyone who tries to take it away. It's a HUGE money-maker for them!

I have a simple policy with any company I do business with: I give you one chance to prove your worth. Lose me as a customer once .. you lose me for life! I will NEVER go back to cable, even if they offer free cable modems and Hummers to their subscribers, or they rename themselves to "Dimbulb Cable Company!"

[1skinsfan2]

I can't understand why the NFL has this deal.All of the other leagues sports packages are on all the providers networks.Why is the NFL package still only on DirectTV.You would think there would be more money in offering it to all the providers.I left DirectTV because they overcharge for everything and I couldn't get the skins in HD.I have verizon FIOS TV now and will enjoy every skins game in HD this year and will save $15 dollars a month on my bill.

[Thanos]

The Ticket is great to have but its really getting out of hand with prices increases.

[Cycopath]

The Ticket is great to have but its really getting out of hand with prices increases.

that is why you have it on auto renew and then argue with them about the price. they will end up giving you a discount and give superfan for free. you can also score other free stuff, i picked up an HD-DVR free, free HD programming, free HBO

[Cycopath]

I had Sunday Ticket on a C-band (analog..10 ft.) dish from the time they introduced it for six or seven years straight (until DirecTv got exclusive rights).

How much equipment and money would have to be invested to truly get every game (let's say for recording purposes so you could go back and actually watch every game)?

it all depends on what you want. do you want to record in HD or standard? are you furnishing other rooms, ie bedroom, kitchen, basement? PM me if you have questions

[Zuck]

But what about the house? It says on the directv site that they will probably have to drill a hole through the wall, so I guess I should get written permission to install it beforehand...hell I may even want the guy present when they install it huh? Anyone here rent a house or apartment?

I used to work for Directv as an installer.

Here's the deal with the landlord thing. Legally they can't say you cannot have Directv installed. They can make certain requests like the dish can't be seen etc. etc. but they can't flat out say no.

If you live in an apartment there's a lot of ways you can install it. There's a tripod the dish can sit on. You can clamp it to a railing with wooden blocks and a strap (so no drilling into the railing) etc. etc.

You can even get the wire into the house without drilling a hole if you use flat cable (a 5 inch connector that can go underneath a window). The bad thing about those is they will break every 4 months or so (you can get them for about $5 or less at the store though).

But in some cases (not many) you just can't do it. For instance if your on the second floor of a 4 building complex, and your balcony faces the opposite direction of the satellite. No way to aim the dish at the satellite because the buildings in the way (unless you can put it on the roof and somehow get the cables down to your apartment).

[radagast5]

First, DirecTV is not "small," by ANY means! They are now owned by News Corp, owner of FOX and Fox News. They have a LOT of moolah. They bid a fortune for exclusive rights to NFL-ST, and they won. So, for the foreseeable future, DirecTV, the original sole-provider for Sunday Ticket, will continue to be sole provider of NFL-ST.

As it should be ..

I didn't realize (until someone pointed it out in this thread) that DirecTV was a subsidiary of the Rupert Murdoch Megaopoly.

As someone who would like to subscribe to Sunday Ticket, were it available like HBO to all varieties of cable providers, it pisses me off that the NFL licenses it exclusively to DirecTV. What I haven't had sufficiently explained to me is how and/or why the NFL thinks that they get more money via an exclusive agreement with DirecTV than they would if they had non-exclusive agreements with all cable providers?

I live in Tampa and have Verizon FiOS providing my cable TV, and because I'm very happy with it, I don't want DirecTV. To get Sunday Ticket, I'd have to subscribe to DirecTV which I'm sure is at least $40/month for five months of football ($200 for September - January). Then I'd have to buy Sunday Ticket ($250) plus that Superfan package ($150). That's $600.

Last year, the Redskins played 18 games (regular/post-season) and of those 18 games, 11 were televised in HD on one of the Tampa network affiliates or ESPN. Using those stats, I'd be paying $600 to watch seven football games, or roughly $86 per game. That's a ridiculous sum of money to pay to watch a football game on TV. (Yes, I know, if I don't like DirecTV, don't get it. Believe me, I won't.)

[Zuck]

On a side note. I called up Directv this year and asked if I could have the superfan added on to my Sunday ticket for free and they said yes.

No joke. It never hurts to ask.

[Zuck]

If you are renting you will need to get approval before they will install it. Then just take it down when you leave. That is what I did and all that was there were a couple of holes from the bolts. Maybe there is a place to put it in the ground on a pole instead of the house.

Just GET IT.

Actually the installer doesn't really care. If you tell them you own the place they'll install it.

But then you could get some heat from your landlord if he see's it.

[Kosher Ham]

Free Superfan for me too. Among other perks.

[KenF]

All I know is Directv is much better than cable.

DirectTV picture quality here is about 1000 times better than cable TV. I'm sure that people in the larger cities have good cable, but for me its no contest.

As for the picture quality, I now have Verizon FiOS which is a completely proprietary fibre optic network. It's an all-in-one system (broadband internet, phone, cable TV) that will, when it's fully up and running, have the ability to upload/download at a rate of 1GB (yes, gigabyte) per second. The picture on it is phenomenal, the number of channels unsurpassed as far as I've seen, and the Pay Per View / Video on Demand options are flat-out ridiculuous. FiOS has only been rolled out in select areas in Texas and Florida, but when it becomes available elsewhere, I highly recommend looking into it.

As Radagast notes, the fiber-based Verizon FiOS TV service knocks the pants off everything else, when it comes to picture quality. It's also a lot cheaper -- $79.90/mo for 200 digital channels and 5Mbps (2Mbps upload) Internet, about $30/mo less than Comcast. They offer 15Mbps Internet for $10 more, and 30Mbps Internet (with 5Mbps uploads) as a premium package. The FiOS HDTV DVR is also very nice, far better than the boxes offered by Comcast and COX in N. VA.

FiOS TV Channel Lineup in N. Virginia (PDF format)

FiOS TV Channel Lineup in Maryland (PDF format)

Why is FiOS so good?

1. FiOS uses digital for every cable channel, unlike most cable providers who use channels 1-99 to deliver most of the popular cable channels in analog format.
   
2. FiOS allocates more bandwidth to its digital channels than the competition; each SD channel is allocated substantially more bandwidth than on DirecTV, and significantly more bandwidth than Comcast. This improves resolution and eliminates compression issues like pixelization, macroblocking, and excess noise.
   
3. FiOS passes HDTV signals through unmodified, unlike DirecTV. DirecTV reduces the resolution of their HDTV from 1920x1080 to 1280x1080, with massive compression that severely degrades the quality of the picture. On DirecTV, you will see artifacting and pixelization during fast movement on Redskins football games. You don't get that on FiOS; with FiOS, you get the original, pristine HD picture and surround sound as it was meant to be seen and heard.
   
4. FiOS is a fiber-based network so they have substantially greater capacity than both satellite and competing cable providers -- which is the reason they now offer 25+ HDTV channels. It is also the reason why their Internet service performs so much better than the competition -- on FiOS, 622Mbps is shared between a maximum of 32 customers; by comparison, on Comcast and Cox, 40Mbps is shared by 10-12 customers (and up to 24 customers in areas that are oversold).
   

As of June 30, FiOS Internet and TV service is now available in the following home exchanges in Northern Virgnia (703-): 133, 237, 241, 462, 531, 532, 533, 534, 536, 538,416, 417, 418 and 419 served by the Falls Church Wire Center, and 243, 248, 276, 312, 387, 465, 522, 524, 525, 527 served by the Arlington Wire Center.

See the FiOS qualification page to see if FiOS TV is ready and available to you right now.

The FiOS construction schedule for Virginia can be viewed here (PDF format).

[Loyal2Washington]

I didn't realize (until someone pointed it out in this thread) that DirecTV was a subsidiary of the Rupert Murdoch Megaopoly.

As someone who would like to subscribe to Sunday Ticket, were it available like HBO to all varieties of cable providers, it pisses me off that the NFL licenses it exclusively to DirecTV. What I haven't had sufficiently explained to me is how and/or why the NFL thinks that they get more money via an exclusive agreement with DirecTV than they would if they had non-exclusive agreements with all cable providers?

It's pretty simple, Directv outbid all the competition by a large amount of money. If the NFL decided to go with allowing everyone to carry the Sunday Ticket then News Corp. would have lowered their bid and put the total amount, from all companies, under 2 billion. Think of it like Dan Snyder offering way more then a player would actually get to ensure that he gets the player he wants, see Lav. Coles.

Secondly the NFL doesn't profit off of commercials, only the networks that carry the games profit, so it is in the NFL's best interest to go with the higher financial bid.

Lastly FOX News Corp. owns Directv and the top 10 local FOX television stations, plus numerous medium to small market stations. This means that News Corp. can out bid all the competiton because the revenue they make off of commercials will cover the 2 billion off of Directv alone. Factor in the revenue off of the local stations, then the playoffs, and then the Super Bowl every 3 years and News Corp now has a strangle hold on the Sunday Ticket.

The Sunday Ticket is the number one reason why people go to Directv, with some 60% of Directv customers ordering the Sunday Ticket, with Directv's yearly growth numbers, look for News Corp. to again out bid the competiton in 2011, unless of course the company decides to go in another direction but with their profits I doubt that will happen.

[jnhay]

I have a big question as well:

Seeing as how my dad is not gonna pay for DirecTV i was wondering, can you get NFL Network on just regular cable tv or is that something you have to get satellite tv to have as well?

any help would be appreciated.

I don't think NFL network is a Directv exclusive, but of course NFL Sunday Ticket is.

[Loyal2Washington]

I don't think NFL network is a Directv exclusive, but of course NFL Sunday Ticket is.

You are correct NFL Network is also on cable.

[radagast5]

Rad,

I also live in central Florida and aside from a few heavy-duty Summer thunderheads which block the signal for up to a minute or two, I never have extended interruptions due to "weather anomalies." Seeing how I watch very little TV during the Summer, it's a non-starter for me. Heck, I even had some friends over to watch a PPV movie back in 1999 when the huge Hurricane Floyd was 50 miles off shore (I'm 40 miles from the Atlantic) and we watched the whole thing right off the sat with less than 5 minutes of outages.

I had DirecTV for a while back in 1999. At least in Tampa, the weather would frequently knock out the signal (2+ times a week). Happily, I have had the new Verizon FiOS service for four months now and haven't had a service interruption once (not including outright power outages).

Contrast this with my former cable company (that I ditched back in 1995) .. then Time Warner, now "Brighthouse" .. whose consistently horrible picture quality (PQ) and even worse "service" who kept blaming my new big screen TV as the culprit. When I made the switch, the PQ of DirecTV blew me away (on that very television that they said was the problem), and still does today. Plus, my other reason for switching was NFL-ST of which I've been a subscriber since 1995. I haven't missed a Redskins game since.

Yeah, the analog channels on BrightHouse were awful and even their digital channels were hit and miss (though none as bad as the analog stuff). The first thing that jumped out at me when I cranked up the Verizon service for the first time was that everything looked amazing (all channels are digital).

Plus, they'll NEVER have NFL-ST, because DirecTV will outbid anyone who tries to take it away. It's a HUGE money-maker for them!

I don't know about that. If you're the NFL, and Time-Warner, AT&T, BellSouth, Cox, Comcast, Charter, and Verizon come to you and tell you they'll each pay $500 million for nonexclusive rights, DirecTV can kiss their contract goodbye.

Here's the real interesting part. The regular cable providers (e.g., Time-Warner, Cox, etc.) are all up in arms because the laws under which they have to work often do not apply to the telecommunications companies (AT&T, Verizon, etc.) because they're not strictly "cable providers." Because the telecommunication companies can circumvent these laws, they are also free to circumvent the exclusive agreements that the cable companies have with certain cities/areas. I'm hoping that the telecommunications companies will similarly circumvent DirecTV's exclusive agreement as well.

[radagast5]

It's pretty simple, Directv outbid all the competition by a large amount of money. If the NFL decided to go with allowing everyone to carry the Sunday Ticket then News Corp. would have lowered their bid and put the total amount, from all companies, under 2 billion.

I completely follow what you're saying. But...what makes you say that Scenario 1 outbids Scenario 2 (below)?

Scenario 1: Status quo. DirecTV buys exclusive rights for $2 billion.

Scenario 2: AT&T, Verizon, BellSouth, BellAtlantic, Cox, Comcast, Time-Warner, Charter, Cablevision, DirecTV and DishNetwork all buy nonexclusive licenses totalling X dollars.

I understand that the parent company for DirecTV has deep pockets, but there's no way they're capable of matching the *collective* pockets of all the above.

Secondly the NFL doesn't profit off of commercials, only the networks that carry the games profit, so it is in the NFL's best interest to go with the higher financial bid.

Why? If the NFL isn't seeing profits from any commercials, what would it matter to them if one company has licensing rights or 30 of them?

Lastly FOX News Corp. owns Directv and the top 10 local FOX television stations, plus numerous medium to small market stations. This means that News Corp. can out bid all the competiton because the revenue they make off of commercials will cover the 2 billion off of Directv alone. Factor in the revenue off of the local stations, then the playoffs, and then the Super Bowl every 3 years and News Corp now has a strangle hold on the Sunday Ticket.

Economics is not my strong suit, but again, you make an argument as to why it's smart for DirecTV to outbid for exclusive rights, and you explain how they can cover the cost. That still doesn't explain how the FOX News Corp. could collectively outbid two dozen other companies if the NFL decided to do nonexclusive agreements with them all. (Frankly, FOX couldn't possibly do that.)

The Sunday Ticket is the number one reason why people go to Directv, with some 60% of Directv customers ordering the Sunday Ticket, with Directv's yearly growth numbers, look for News Corp. to again out bid the competiton in 2011, unless of course the company decides to go in another direction but with their profits I doubt that will happen.

My one hope is that the contract between NFL/DirecTV can be circumvented by the telecommunications companies. I cordially dislike monopolies and that's what DirecTV has. Sunday Ticket is a wonderful product, and while I completely understand where people in rural areas love satellite TV, I do not like DirecTV and am frankly pretty pissed that I'd have to go through the hassle and expense to get it just to watch Sunday Ticket.

Thanks very much for the explanation, by the way.

[radagast5]

KenF: that was a great explanation of the perks of FiOS, and hopefully a clear illustration of some of the reasons why DirecTV (as nice as it is for some markets) is not an appealing alternative for me. Thanks for the details.

[gridironmike]

it all depends on what you want. do you want to record in HD or standard? are you furnishing other rooms, ie bedroom, kitchen, basement? PM me if you have questions

I'm just asking a generic question. If you wanted to be able to actually record every game on Sunday Ticket so you could actually watch every game in it's entirety (one room with either standard or high def), you'd need what equipment? I'd say you would need a six room system with DVR on each receiver and another (at least) four room system with DVRs. That would also constitute two Sunday Ticket subscriptions, wouldn't it?

Week one has nine 1:00 games, week 2 nine, week 3 eight, week 4 eight, week 5 eight, week 6 eight, week 7 eight, week 8 eight, week 9 nine, week 10 twelve, week 11 twelve, week 12 eleven, week 13 twelve, week 14 eleven, week 15 ten, week 16 nine, week 17 thirteen! That means you'd need two six room systems and a one room all with DVRs?? My cable DVR can record two programs at the same time, so would a six room system with DVR be able to record twelve games?

[KenF]

I'm just asking a generic question. If you wanted to be able to actually record every game on Sunday Ticket so you could actually watch every game in it's entirety (one room with either standard or high def), you'd need what equipment? I'd say you would need a six room system with DVR on each receiver and another (at least) four room system with DVRs. That would also constitute two Sunday Ticket subscriptions, wouldn't it?

You would need six two-tuner DVRs to record twelve games showing simultaneously. You would need only one Sunday Ticket subscription, but each box beyond the first costs $5/mo.

[Loyal2Washington]

I completely follow what you're saying. But...what makes you say that Scenario 1 outbids Scenario 2 (below)?

Scenario 1: Status quo. DirecTV buys exclusive rights for $2 billion.

Scenario 2: AT&T, Verizon, BellSouth, BellAtlantic, Cox, Comcast, Time-Warner, Charter, Cablevision, DirecTV and DishNetwork all buy nonexclusive licenses totalling X dollars.

You're welcome for the explaination but to answer your question above, the total dollar amount of 2 billion dollars beat out the other offers. The NFL would gladly expand the Sunday Ticket to cable companies but their collective offer wasn't near the 2 billion dollar mark. One must also factor in that News Corp. overpaying for the NFC games also factored into the decision by the NFL.

I understand where you are coming from in the idea that if all the cable companies put money into the pot they could beat out News Corp. but the fact is they did not offer the amount of News Corp. Thus Sunday Ticket remains an exlusive Directv package.

[gridironmike]

You would need six two-tuner DVRs to record twelve games showing simultaneously. You would need only one Sunday Ticket subscription, but each box beyond the first costs $5/mo.

OK. I didn't even take into consideration games that are blacked out because of local affiliates. I'd need my HD cable DVR and the six two-tuner DirecTv HD DVRs. You might as well get your money's worth!