Netflix is ​​dialing in live sports with the NFL’s Christmas spectacular

“I guess we’ll see,” said Brian Rolapp, director of communications and business at the NFL. “We’ve got a multi-year agreement now and I think the focus is on making sure it’s great and getting that done. I think with Netflix, it’s similar to other platforms. Our business grew with it.”

For its part, Netflix isn’t ready to declare the Christmas games a harbinger of more NFL on its platform. Riegg said the company is selective about the type of live sports it streams, favoring one-off shows over a season-long package. “I thought it had to feel like something that we could really pay attention to and ‘eventize’ for our members and that felt different,” Riegg said.

“The audience is big and the conversation is big,” he added. “Those are the criteria.”

Christmas hoods will meet those requirements. The Chiefs-Steelers game, which kicks off at 1 p.m., will feature some of the sport’s biggest names, Patrick Mahomes And Travis Kelce, while two-time MVP Lamar Jackson will lead the Ravens against the Texans at 4:30 p.m. Not to mention, Netflix has already exploited it Beyoncé performed at halftime of the second game, while Mariah Carey will appear in a pre-recorded performance of her iconic holiday tune. The company has also assembled a small team of commentators and entertainers to contribute to its coverage.

The opportunity to partner with the NFL during the holiday season is a case of Netflix being “opportunistic,” Riegg said.

“We certainly don’t participate in sports in the traditional sense. We are not bidding on NBA packages. It’s not like we’re carrying 18 weeks of the NFL season,” he said. “But when the NFL said, We want to make Christmas Day a thing, we engaged with them because of the checklist of what we look for with these live events. Is it a large audience and does it attract a lot of conversation and buzz?

With the NFL increasingly shifting its content from linear television to digital platforms, Netflix will be the third streamer to exclusively release a game this season. Amazon’s Prime Video has served as the weekly home of Thursday Night Football as of 2022, while the NBC-owned Peacock streaming service aired the week one game between the Green Bay Packers and Philadelphia Eagles in September in São Paulo, Brazil. Prime Video will also stream an NFL playoff game next month, after Peacock became the first streaming service to exclusively show a postseason game last January.

Rolapp said the league has “intentionally” pivoted to a digital platform. The NFL exclusively streamed its first game in 2015 on Yahoo and began simulcasting games on what was then called Twitter in 2016. Their deal with Amazon was Thursday Night Football, Signed in 2021 and running until 2033, “it has been years in the making,” Rolapp said. “We are not rushing into any of this,” he added. “Netflix is ​​no different. That foundation has grown.”

It remains to be seen how the NFL’s partnership with Netflix develops. Rolap said so midfielder, the 2023 Netflix docuseries about soccer’s most important position is the “origin” of the league’s relationship with the company. Midfielder and the next series this summer Receiver has allowed Netflix, which says it has 283 million subscribers in more than 190 countries, to expand its global reach.

“Not only have they been a hit in the United States, but around the world, they’ve gotten quite a bit of attention,” Rolapp said.

Rolapp noted that the league’s Christmas deal with Netflix is ​​the first time the NFL has negotiated a worldwide distributed game package. And with the NFL planning to increase the number of international matches from five to eight next season, there have been suggestions that some matches could be carried by Netflix. Rolapp didn’t really put that speculation to rest.

“I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we’re making the first truly global deal for a game bundle, and at the same time we’re really focused on how to grow games internationally and We are playing more games internationally than ever before. before,” he said. “When you’re trying to grow the sport internationally, it’s important that you really bring your best product to those territories.”