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NFL Hit With $4.7 Billion Damages in Sunday Ticket Trial, Jets Fans Request Additional Pain & Suffering Compensation

jetstream23

By jetstream23
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jetstream23

jetstream23

Posted
Posted

Well, the first part was true.  The second part just feels like something we should do. 😛

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June 27, 2024, 1:27 PM MST

NFL Hit With About $4.7 Billion Damages in Sunday Ticket Trial

The National Football League was hit with about $4.7 billion in damages — which could be tripled under federal law — after losing a jury trial over anticompetitive features of its Sunday Ticket broadcast package.

A jury in Los Angeles federal court sided Thursday with football fans who claimed the league conspired with DirecTV to raise the price of subscriptions to watch away games. The NFL and its teams made the unusual decision to fight the consumer class-action lawsuit at trial instead of negotiating a settlement

--With assistance from Maia Spoto.

https://news.bloomberglaw.com/antitrust/nfl-hit-with-about-4-7-billion-damages-in-sunday-ticket-trial

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  • jetstream23 changed the title to NFL Hit With $4.7 Billion Damages in Sunday Ticket Trial, Jets Fans Request Additional Pain & Suffering Compensation
Stark

Stark

Posted
Posted
7 minutes ago, Bungaman said:

Excellent. Give me a single team stream option for let's say $10 a game/$170 total, and an optional lump sum $50 for the playoffs. 

How late before the opener should I be able to decide on the team? 🤣

Man. I think they gonna make a single game more than that. Just because they can.  I’d hope for a price like you listed 

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PFSIKH

PFSIKH

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11 hours ago, Bungaman said:

Excellent. Give me a single team stream option for let's say $10 a game/$170 total, and an optional lump sum $50 for the playoffs. 

How late before the opener should I be able to decide on the team? 🤣

I am going to throw this out there.  Whatever was paid to buy the Sunday Ticket will be the starting cost to buy games for your team.  I would even venture that a 18 game (+1 pre-season) package will be double the price.  Hell, triple.

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Bruce Harper

Bruce Harper

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Nice! I always found it crazy that they expect you to pay to watch all teams when you mostly just watch one team. I’ve never purchased any of these plans because of that. So no check for me. But now I could see myself buying a Jets only package (pending price).


I’ve never paid for it, even though I’m out of market, because I thought it was too expensive. Instead, I’ve spent a fortune on crappy food and beer at sports bars.


Sent from my iPhone using JetNation.com mobile app
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peebag

peebag

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11 hours ago, OilfieldJet said:

This is a real loss for the NFL. It won’t mean much to subscribers who have paid in the past, but it sure will be good for fans in the future. 

It took 10 years for the suit to get to this point. It will be another 10 before anything will be done.

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OilfieldJet

OilfieldJet

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13 minutes ago, peebag said:

It took 10 years for the suit to get to this point. It will be another 10 before anything will be done.

As far as actually receiving damages for the past, I agree, but I bet the NFL changes the packaging. Even if/when they appeal, the incremental cost of continuing Sunday Ticket as is has to be too high. Maybe not, but I hope to see an a-la-cart offering this year.

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rangerous

rangerous

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you would think teams would be able to stream their own games, for a fee.  we see this now where movies still playing in theatres can be seen on some of the major streaming services.  this is pretty much where it was thought the whole internet content was going during the dot bomb in 2000 or so.  they were way over their skis back then.  not so much now.  i know i would pay for a jets streaming tv channel that broadcast their games plus other events throughout the year.

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Integrity28

Integrity28

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2 minutes ago, Warfish said:

That was me for something like 15 years, lol.  I feel you on this one. 

Same. I’ve been in Georgia, Indiana and Massachusetts over the past 20+

My buddy let me log into his Sunday ticket wayyyy back from my PlayStation 3. Otherwise, I’ve worked the bars (but in Mass they don’t cooperate), as well as illegal streams, IP fakes, and all of it. Fortunately with Rodgers, most games were just naturally available last year.

Its a pita. 

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nycdan

nycdan

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Long, long ago, when players worked summers to supplement their income, and games were free to watch on TV (in-market only mostly), nobody had any complaints about going to games.  Ticket and food costs were reasonable in comparison to income/wealth at that time. 

But when QBs are holding out over the insult of only being offered $40M per season to play, fans are gonna be pissed about prices.  There are always some folks here who say nothing will change and fans are gonna keep paying, but this is a sign that it's not necessarily that way.  I think the league (and MLB and NBA) have reached a tipping point where they can't keep extracting endless revenue from fans.  Billion dollar stadium bonds, games behind multiple paywalls, $14 beers, $55 parking pass per game, $100+ upper deck seats, games 9 time-zones away, draft split into a three-day televised ad-fest... all chasing the very last dollar of revenue and it's getting a lot more attention than it used to.  

I think the league has lost sight of its audience or has a very skewed view of what we actually want and it's not great for the game or the fans.  Just the owners.  Maybe it won't amount to much, but I wouldn't hate seeing a little blowback just to slow this all down. 

And before you reply, keep in mind I am a staunch capitalist and free-market guy.  I'm not suggesting anything other than my own observation that squeezing a few more dollars (on top of the billions they already earn) in the short term may not be good in the long term or, at the very least, it pisses me off personally.

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bicketybam

bicketybam

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I have no idea what I'm going to do for the upcoming season. I live in CT, close to the NY border. I use FUBO for TV and my local CBS is the Harford affiliate. If the Jets and the Pats both play at the same time, I don't get the Jets. I get the Pats instead.

I was a DirecTV Sunday ticket subscriber for 6 years and last year I went with the YouTube TV version at a promotional rate. This year the renewal is $450. The Jets and Pats play at the same time on 2 occasions (9/15 and 12/22.) 12/29 is a flex game for the Pars so it could be 3. I do like watching other games around the league but $450 is a lot of money for 2-3 Jet games and other out of market games that I may or may not watch.

Does anyone know when Sunday Ticket gets its price reduced during the season? I can make arrangements for the 9/15 game and then pick up a discounted partial season for the 1 or 2 December games.

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Scott Dierking

Scott Dierking

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Here is a more complete version of this news item:

 

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The NFL has been found guilty of breaking antitrust laws in its distribution of out-of-market Sunday afternoon games on the “Sunday Ticket” premium subscription service.

Even though the jury of five men and three women in a U.S. District Court awarded nearly $4.8 billion in damages Thursday to residential and commercial subscribers of “Sunday Ticket,” don’t expect any settlement checks or the shuttering of the service anytime soon.

What did the jury determine?

The league broke antitrust laws by selling “Sunday Ticket” only on DirecTV and at an inflated price. By offering the service on only one distributor and with a high price, that limited the subscriber base and satisfied concerns by CBS and Fox about preserving local ratings while the NFL got a lot of money for its broadcast rights.

How long was the trial?

Three weeks. It began with opening statements on June 6 and featured 10 days of testimony before closing arguments on Wednesday. The jury deliberated for nearly five hours Wednesday and Thursday before coming to a decision.

 
The NFL brought in Commissioner Roger Goodell and Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones to testify, but it didn’t help. The plaintiffs’ mostly used economists and video from pre-trial deposition.

 

 

 

Who were the plaintiffs?

The class action applied to more than 2.4 million residential subscribers and 48,000 businesses, mostly bars and restaurants, that purchased “NFL Sunday Ticket” from June 17, 2011, to Feb. 7, 2023.

What is the breakdown of the damages?

 

The jury awarded $4.7 billion to residential subscribers and $96 million to businesses. Because damages are trebled under federal antitrust laws, the NFL could end up being liable for $14.39 billion unless it reaches a settlement or it is reduced

The residential damages were slightly less than the $5.6 billion offered under the plaintiffs’ College Football Model but more than a model where “Sunday Ticket” would have multiple carriers and a 49.7% reduction in the subscription cost ($2.81 billion).

 
The business damages were much lower than the plaintiffs presented in any of their three models. The lowest was $332 million under what was called the “NFL Tax” model.

How would the NFL pay damages?

It would be spread equally among the 32 teams. That means each one could be paying as much as $449.6 million.

Will there be any immediate changes?

Changes to the “Sunday Ticket” package and/or the ways the NFL carries its Sunday afternoon games would be stayed until all appeals have been concluded. It could consider offering team-by-team or week-by-week packages along with reducing the price.

ESPN proposed offering “Sunday Ticket” for $70 per season with team-by-team packages in 2022, but it was turned down by the NFL before it went with YouTube TV.

If the NFL offered team-by-team packages all along, one of the key class members likely would not have been part of the lawsuit.

Rob Lippincott — a New Orleans native who moved to California — bought “Sunday Ticket” only for Saints games.

“He just wanted the Saints. If he had a choice to buy a single-team package and watch the Saints games, he absolutely would have,” plaintiffs attorney Amanda Bonn said during her opening remarks on June 6.

 
But college football had to change, why not the NFL?

The landmark college football TV case in 1984 was determined by the U.S. Supreme Court. This was at the U.S. District Court level.

The NFL said it would appeal the verdict. That appeal would go to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals and then possibly the Supreme Court.

It wouldn’t be the first time the 9th Circuit has seen this case.

The lawsuit was originally filed in 2015 by the Mucky Duck sports bar in San Francisco. On June 30, 2017, U.S. District Judge Beverly Reid O’Connell dismissed the lawsuit and ruled for the NFL. Two years later, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated the case.

What were the keys to the plaintiffs’ case?

During his closing remarks, lead attorney Bill Carmody showed an April 2017 NFL memo that showed the league was exploring a world without “Sunday Ticket” in 2017, where cable channels would air Sunday afternoon out-of-market games not shown on Fox or CBS.

Judge Philip S. Gutierrez voiced his frustration with the plaintiffs’ attorneys midway through the trial, but the closing argument by Carmody was clear and easy to understand.

 
Was the NFL an underdog in this trial?

The NFL might be the king of American sports and one of the most powerful leagues in the world but it often loses in court, especially in Los Angeles. It was in an LA federal court in 1982 that a jury ruled the league violated antitrust rules by not allowing Al Davis to move the Raiders from Oakland to Los Angeles.

What’s next?

All eyes turn to July 31 when Gutierrez is scheduled to hear post-trial motions. That will include the NFL’s request to have him rule in favor of the league because the judge determined the plaintiffs did not prove their case.

Could this impact other sports?

All the major U.S. leagues offer out-of-market packages. They are keeping an eye on this case because individual teams selling their out-of-market streaming rights, especially in baseball, would further separate the haves from the have nots.

 

A major difference though is that MLB, the NBA and the NHL sell their out-of-market packages on multiple distributors and share in the revenue per subscriber instead of receiving an outright rights fee.

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fltflo

fltflo

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There is no doubt it would be smart of the NFL to sell single team out of market season pass. They would be wise to also not try and gouge these potential clients with outrageous cost.
If they sell a season for say under 200.00 dollars,they would get 10’s of thousands of new revenue sources.
The NFL better understand that many fans are learning how to stream from outside sources and it’s much too late to begin even think about trying to stop it. That ship sailed long ago and was lost at sea. For every stream they might close down 5 more will pop up. An that is in the United States, many of these servers are located outside of Americas reach and beyond prosecution. So offer a great product with a stable stream at a reasonable price and I guarantee they will have more paying fans across the country and the world.


Sent from my iPhone using JetNation.com mobile app

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slats

slats

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Sunday Ticket is highway robbery, and the NFL has always known this. I had their International Package for a couple years when I first moved to Mexico. Identical product (every game, condensed viewing, coaches film, red zone channel, etc.), but for well less than half the price. I don’t think they were losing money on me, either. 

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