Neil Cybart 1/9/23 Neil Cybart 1/9/23

Apple Bows Out of NFL Sunday Ticket Bidding, YouTube Wins NFL Sunday Ticket, YouTube Moves Deeper Into Paid Video (Daily Update)

Hello everyone. Welcome to a new week.

In today’s update, we will circle back to some big Apple news that came out as we were entering the holiday break. The update begins with Neil’s thoughts on Apple bowing out of NFL Sunday Ticket bidding. The discussion then turns to YouTube winning NFL Sunday Ticket, and what the move tells us about Google’s changed strategy.

Apple Bows Out of NFL Sunday Ticket Bidding

In an article published on December 16th, here’s ProFootballTalk:

"The company once regarded as the frontrunner for NFL Sunday Ticket has opted to take a Sunday drive, instead.

Buried in an item on Puck.news from Dylan Byer and Julia Alexander regarding recent changes at the top of Disney is an NFL bombshell: Apple has bowed out of the bidding for the out-of-market package the DirecTV will relinquish in only 23 days.

Here’s the key quote, from Byer: 'I’m now told that Apple, once seen as a frontrunner for the rights, has also backed out of those negotiations - not because they can’t afford it, but because they don’t see the logic. So it’s down to Amazon and Google, and there’s certainly a logic there for both companies: Amazon can use it to drive Prime subscriptions; Google can use it to fuel its YouTube TV business.'"

The fact that this bidding war had lingered into December was a clue that things weren’t going in Apple’s direction. For being the front-runner, ongoing negotiations pointed to the NFL and Apple not seeing eye-to-eye on various fronts. As for those sticking points, here’s The Athletic:

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