The Scoop
If the National Football League puts too many games behind a paywall, it could risk losing its antitrust exemptions, FCC Chair Brendan Carr told Semafor.
“Does the NFL still benefit from the antitrust exemption when they’re negotiating for carriage of games not on a sponsored telecast, but on a streaming service?” Carr said at a Washington, DC, event Thursday. “That’s a very live, very ripe question.”
Carr said there is “a point at which you sort of tip the scale, and they’ve just put too many games behind a paywall, and then that whole exemption collapses.”
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The NFL’s move to shift live sports from broadcast channels to streaming services has become a flashpoint in Washington, where critics fear that moving sports rights behind paywalls is driving up costs for consumers.
A 1961 sports broadcast law exempts the NFL from US antitrust laws to negotiate leaguewide TV deals, but only if it adheres to certain criteria, including customer access. There’s a fair amount at stake if the NFL loses its antitrust exemption, especially if individual teams start to sell their TV rights separately.
“If the NFL teams were able to collectively negotiate,” Carr said, “should the broadcasters, perhaps, be able to collectively negotiate as well?”
Room for Disagreement
For its part, the league has argued that streaming platforms are starting to replace broadcast networks and that it needs to meet its customers where they are.
The FCC is currently seeking public comment on the shift to streaming services.
Last month Carr told Semafor that moving sports behind paywalls undermines a mission to keep local news afloat. “There’s been a great partnership between broadcasters and sports rights over the years. And the sports rights have been great that it’s on broadcast because it grows the audience for the sports leagues, but it also helps to bring viewers to local broadcast TV,” he told Semafor’s Ben Smith.