Thursday Night Football is now in its third season on Prime Video, long enough for NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell to know the league made the right move, at the right time.
Fans and media had some concerns when Amazon obtained the broadcast rights to Thursday Night Football through 2033. But ratings, which started slow that first season, have come on strong. Sports Media Watch reported that TNF ratings through Week 9 this season are the highest since 2019, when Fox and the NFL Network carried the games. Amazon is averaging an audience of 13 million viewers, up 4% year-over-year.
Goodell isn’t exactly spiking the football after making the prescient deal. But in an appearance at Liberty Media’s investor day this week, he said the move to put games on Prime Video has paid off as viewers become more comfortable with streaming.
“It’s just changing, and you have to be at the leading edge of some of these technologies, and you have to take a little bit leap of faith there at some point with good partners,” Goodell said (via Sports Business Journal). “I think we’ve chosen [to do that] in the streaming space, in particular Amazon and YouTube [the home of the league’s Sunday Ticket offering], and I think both of them are going to be in the space, and dominant in the space, for a long time.”
The commissioner also could have mentioned Netflix, which earlier this year reached a three-year deal to broadcast Christmas Day NFL games, including two this year.
Goodell’s message is clear: While the NFL still remains primarily invested in network TV, the league knows it must continue exploring streaming partners.
“People are still watching network television for the big events, and I think that’s why we have stayed there,” Goodell said. “We’ve also moved to streaming because there’s a large number of people that are not watching network that are still fans of ours, or we want to make them our fans.”
