Because the NFL is all about greed. Greed is why they play on Thursdays. Greed is why they play at the crack of dawn in England. Greed is why they play 17, soon 18 games. Greed is why they play exhibition games. Greed is why they have round after round of playoffs. Greed is why they have "flex" scheduling (shout out to the Giants owner who killed that for Thursday night games, but they will be back for it soon, too greedy). Greed is why they threaten to move teams to more and more ridiculous AAA sized small cites. Greed is why 25 year old stadiums are supposedly "out of date". Greed.
They admit, as if anyone didn't already know this, that the internet cannot get it done. Duh. So they could have simply made a reasonable deal with DirecTV, which is already in every sports centered business already, where the NFL made some money and DirecTV made some money. But that is not how the NFL operates. It wants all the chips.
So, now the ball is in DirecTV's court. It can pay to be a "non-exclusive" distributor, and lose money doing it. Or it can enter into a war where the NFL partners with cable, and/or Cheap Charlie, trying to take over the sports bar business. Since they certainly cannot sign up every cable system in the country, and, even if they did, lots of businesses are in non-residential areas not wired for cable, many will miss out. And Cheap Charlie's Pluto like service is a non-starter relative to every other sport, meaning two dishes, two bills, two receivers.
The loser is the fan. As always. Greed.