It is not the first and it will not be the last, but that doesn’t make it any more palatable for some fans
The NFL granted Prime Video the exclusive broadcasting rights for the AFC wild-card round game between the Steelers and Ravens that kicked off at 8 p.m. Saturday, and fans, stuck on the other side of the paywall once again, are fuming.
“Just another reason to quit watching the NFL … putting playoff games on prime, what a joke,” wrote one.
“The day has finally come where they are ruining the sport … Wake up NFL! not everyone can afford to pay for prime video,” said another.
“We as a country need to rally together and fight back against the NFL and all the streaming services,” opined a third.
Last season, the NFL signed a $100 million deal that allowed Peacock to broadcast a wild-card round game between the Dolphins and the Chiefs.
The game reached a total of 32.1 million viewers, becoming, at the time, the most-streamed live event in U.S. history.
Amazon smashed the previous deal with Peacock with a new record-setting payment — $120 million — for the rights to the Steelers-Ravens matchup, Front Office Sports reported.
This comes after Amazon paid about $100 million to stream the league’s first Black Friday game between the Dolphins and Jets in November 2023.
Amazon also streams “Thursday Night Football” games, a deal that costs around $1 billion per season.
That deal runs through 2033.
