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http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303376904579138091683799998?mod=WSJ_business_LeadStoryCollection
The National Football League is considering selling another slate of Thursday games to a media outlet to increase the audience for football on one of television's most competitive nights, according to a person familiar with the league's strategy.
The Chicago Bears and New York Giants played Thursday, Oct 10. AP
The NFL is disappointed its own cable channel, NFL Network, hasn't attracted more viewers for the 13 Thursday night games it airs each season, the person said. The league believes that adding a second game to create double-headers on some Thursdays could create more national interest.
The process is still in the preliminary phase, the person familiar with the league's strategy said. Executives have discussed the issue with media outlets but the league isn't shopping a specific package and no formal offers have been received, the person said.
Adding another several hours of football on Thursday nights would have significant implications in the TV industry. Thursdays have historically been a big night for advertisers like auto makers and movie studios looking to promote weekend openings. As a result broadcast networks put some of their best shows on that night.
The Thursday night NFL Network games have been closely followed in the markets of the participating teams but have not become must-see television in the same way that NBC's Sunday Night and ESPN's Monday Night Football games are. They are usually the least-watched nationally televised games of the week, in part because the NFL Network still isn't fully distributed.
Asked about the performance of the Thursday night games at last week's owners meetings, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said he was pleased with the growth of the NFL Network's ratings. He added, "People want to watch it and are excited about Thursday Night Football. It is our job to build Thursday Night Football and make it, 'This is where you want to be on Thursday.'"
The additional games would be taken from the Sunday afternoon schedule, now shown on CBS and Fox, and wouldn't affect deals the NFL has with NBC and ESPN. The league negotiated in its most recent TV agreements the rights to pull games from the Sunday afternoon schedule and use them to create another package of games.
The league also could move Thursday night games shown on NFL Network to another channel. The network may be able to drop some games without suffering a decrease in the affiliate fees it charges distributors to carry the network, the person familiar with the league's strategy said. If the NFL Network were to sell off all of its games, it would be forced to renegotiate its affiliate agreements.
Potential buyers of the games would likely be national cable sports networks. But league officials have also considered selling the Thursday night package to a nontraditional media partner, including online players like Netflix Inc. or Google Inc., the person said.
The league believes it can work with a new entrant just as it did in the 1990s when it joined with with satellite television provider DirecTV to create NFL Sunday Ticket, which gave subscribers the ability to view every NFL game throughout the season rather than limiting them to games in their market and those that are nationally televised.
Write to Matthew Futterman at matthew.futterman@wsj.com and Shalini Ramachandran at shalini.ramachandran@wsj.com
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