NFL ST for 2012 update

[JUCJ85]

At $9/mo, E* football fans will pay around $45 to see a channel that some consider to be the very best NFL channel available. A channel that a D* fan has to pay $300 to get. For fans who love the Red Zone channel, I'd say that E* most certainly outflanks D* on this one.

As many fans mostly watch their home region team, and they get all of those games for free from the networks, plus the Sunday night game, plus the Monday night game, plus an additional Sunday game, again all in their basic package. Then they can add Red Zone to that for $45. This is a very nice alternative offering to what D* offers. Especially given that only a small fraction of NFL fans subscribe to ST.

I was very skeptical of the RZC when it was introduced in 2009, I enjoyed it for the 2009 season when I was with Dish, I understand the reason for the channel, it's a nice alternative to the ST, especially for fans of their teams in their region, gives them extra on gameday.

But for some like myself, who don't live in my teams area(Not even close, in NY, and a 49ers fan), I see maybe 3-4 games a year in a normal year, now it could be as high as 8-10 with the 5 primetime, plus GB, NO, NYG, NYJ and week 17 game. But i'm one of those fans who needs to see every game, I don't work weekends, so I'm home every weekend to watch.

It would be nice if they would in the future, have an package add-on for each RZC and To-Go seperate, as some only want RZC or To-Go. I want both, so gladly am paying 299.95.

 

[gadgtfreek]

I dunno why every thread has to be Directv vs Dish, or better yet, why are they giving that guy what he wants and not me.

I had RZC two years with Dish, and vs watching the entire game I wanted to see, it sucked. It was great at the price sure, but for a true fan of the sport ST is the way to go. I was close last year to buying it, but I love the $199 price this year and they have a new customer. Im also not in a NFL market, unless you count the Aint's and the Falcons, neither of which I care about.

I deal with this yearly during college football, I work around a bunch of college "fans", which basically means "I only watch Alabama/Auburn's game so I can act like I know what Im talking about on Monday"(same thing around here with Aint's on Sunday). My wife and I on the other hand, run two tv's all day every saturday, and watch as much football as we can period. I'd like to sit down on Sunday and have access to all the big games, but the price was never right.

Im also the guy that used to always buy Gameplan before the ESPN deals, and we still buy the 1 Auburn and 1 Bama PPV every year for $30. I like football. $199 ST is great for me, and I could give a rats arse about RZC, because I think each package appeals to two different types of people.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Well, I just signed up for the 5 payments, $199.95, easy as pie. Now, when will August/Sept be here!!!

 

[lern4483]

That price is a great deal.

Fantastic price!!! No complaints.

 

[Rey]

Well, I just signed up for the 5 payments, $199.95, easy as pie. Now, when will August/Sept be here!!!

Congrats!!

 

[JUCJ85]

Well, I just signed up for the 5 payments, $199.95, easy as pie. Now, when will August/Sept be here!!!

Man, I can't wait, wish it was late july with Training Camps underway, I love football and the Ticket. Big 49ers fan, and excited for tomorrow through saturday, draft weekend.

 

[Tom Bombadil]

I am a D* subscriber and as I am a Packer fan who lives in Wisconsin, I am more than satisfied with the network and ESPN games. I've never sub'ed to ST and really never been tempted to. It would be a waste of money for me.

Nevertheless, I do think that E*'s low priced offering of RZ is a great strategy by them. For there are millions and millions of NFL fans who are in the same boat as me. Only a small percentage of NFL fans sub to ST, probably only around 2% to 3%. Based upon the numbers provided by investment analysts for what D* needed to achieve in ST subscriber growth in order to recover the revenue lost from this year's ST price reductions, D* only had 400,000 to 500,000 paying ST subs last year.

So if E*, and cable providers, can write those subs off and make their fans happy with a low priced RZ offering, that's a good strategy IMHO.

Meanwhile the only provider who can't offer RZ for a low price is D* because it will eat away at their ST subscriber base. Therefore E* and cable providers have an opportunity to lure non-ST D* subs over to them.

I read that D* had about 1 million subs who got ST for free last year, as part of a promo. Thus about 2/3rds of everyone getting ST, was getting it free. So they lowered the price, hoping to get a fair number of those free subs to pay for it this year.

 

[PhilAce]

I too live in my home team's market, so I see no need to purchase ST. I would, however, be willing to pay market value for Red Zone channel as a stand alone. I guess I will have go through retention again this year. It doesn't make sense that they are giving RZ free through retention when many customers would pay for it if it was offered.

 

[JUCJ85]

I am a D* subscriber and as I am a Packer fan who lives in Wisconsin, I am more than satisfied with the network and ESPN games. I've never sub'ed to ST and really never been tempted to. It would be a waste of money for me.

Nevertheless, I do think that E*'s low priced offering of RZ is a great strategy by them. For there are millions and millions of NFL fans who are in the same boat as me. Only a small percentage of NFL fans sub to ST, probably only around 2% to 3%. Based upon the numbers provided by investment analysts for what D* needed to achieve in ST subscriber growth in order to recover the revenue lost from this year's ST price reductions, D* only had 400,000 to 500,000 paying ST subs last year.

So if E*, and cable providers, can write those subs off and make their fans happy with a low priced RZ offering, that's a good strategy IMHO.

Meanwhile the only provider who can't offer RZ for a low price is D* because it will eat away at their ST subscriber base. Therefore E* and cable providers have an opportunity to lure non-ST D* subs over to them.

I read that D* had about 1 million subs who got ST for free last year, as part of a promo. Thus about 2/3rds of everyone getting ST, was getting it free. So they lowered the price, hoping to get a fair number of those free subs to pay for it this year.

For my market, Albany NY area, we don't have RZC on our local cable provider, Time Warner, they also don't carry NFL Network. I walk around my town, and see so many houses with DirecTV or Dish Network, some with both. It seems like people are sick of Time Warner's high prices. So Dish makes sense for the local teams fans for RZC, while DirecTV is logical for a fan like myself who can't stand the local teams(Giants and Jets).

I think they had to lower it due to losing games to NFL Network's Thursday Night Games. Plus it was ridiculous pricing. I felt by 2014 or so it would hit the 500.00 mark. Which would cause a lot of fans to no longer sub to the ticket. Which I don't blame them if they did.

I don't think every subscriber to DirecTV is a NFL ST buyer, for me I hate enough with cable's high prices, and just switched.

 

[Tom Bombadil]

I don't think every subscriber to DirecTV is a NFL ST buyer ... .

It isn't that not every D* subscriber is a ST subscriber, it is that less than 3% of D* subscribers are ST subs. D*'s goal with the lower prices is to drive the subscriber base much higher.

 

[rapidturtle]

Funny we were talking at work today about how much it cost to actually go to game. Tickets, parking food and such. $200 is a pretty good deal to get to see every game.

 

[Jimbo]

I am a D* subscriber and as I am a Packer fan who lives in Wisconsin, I am more than satisfied with the network and ESPN games. I've never sub'ed to ST and really never been tempted to. It would be a waste of money for me.

Nevertheless, I do think that E*'s low priced offering of RZ is a great strategy by them. For there are millions and millions of NFL fans who are in the same boat as me. Only a small percentage of NFL fans sub to ST, probably only around 2% to 3%. Based upon the numbers provided by investment analysts for what D* needed to achieve in ST subscriber growth in order to recover the revenue lost from this year's ST price reductions, D* only had 400,000 to 500,000 paying ST subs last year.

So if E*, and cable providers, can write those subs off and make their fans happy with a low priced RZ offering, that's a good strategy IMHO.

Meanwhile the only provider who can't offer RZ for a low price is D* because it will eat away at their ST subscriber base. Therefore E* and cable providers have an opportunity to lure non-ST D* subs over to them.

I read that D* had about 1 million subs who got ST for free last year, as part of a promo. Thus about 2/3rds of everyone getting ST, was getting it free. So they lowered the price, hoping to get a fair number of those free subs to pay for it this year.

I think last year it was part of the promo to get it free, it won't be free for those subs this year.

I gotta wonder, you being a Packers fan, if they weren't on TV most weeks, would you then decide to get the Ticket ?

 

[cb35]

I'm annoyed the Red Zone Channel isn't included in the $199 price point - I think this price drop is a mirage they stripped out one of the best channels and then try to upsell it in another bogus package? very disappointing - hopefully I can get a reasonable rep in August that will add it in - I'll forgo the mobile app. RZ and NFL ST HD for $199 is fair.

 

[Jimbo]

I'm annoyed the Red Zone Channel isn't included in the $199 price point - I think this price drop is a mirage they stripped out one of the best channels and then try to upsell it in another bogus package? very disappointing - hopefully I can get a reasonable rep in August that will add it in - I'll forgo the mobile app. RZ and NFL ST HD for $199 is fair.

You'll probably be able to do that later ...

I am one of the MANY that have shouted LOUDLY to give us the ST in HD alone for a long time now ...
Tired of paying the extra money for the Fantasy guys .... for many years, this is BEFORE the RZ channel was around as well, or at least before it was a Highly regarded channel.
I don't remember if the RZ channel was there from the beginning or not.

RZ channels really wasn't much till the OTHER providers were allowed to get it.

 

[Tom Bombadil]

I think last year it was part of the promo to get it free, it won't be free for those subs this year.

I gotta wonder, you being a Packers fan, if they weren't on TV most weeks, would you then decide to get the Ticket ?

None of the people who got it free last year are slotted to get it free again. That was a bit over 1,000,000 subs. D* estimated that less than 100,000 were going to renew & pay for it. That was part of their reasoning for dropping the price.

Being a Packer fan and living in Wisconsin, all of the Packers' games are on TV. Between all of the network games, Sunday night games, Monday night games and NFL Network games, I get far more NFL than I would ever watch.

$200 is a decent price for someone who really loves a team and lives out of that team's home region. Whether I would pay it, I don't know. I would probably scan the projected broadcast schedules in my area and if I was going to be able to watch 8 to 10 games of my favorite team for free, I doubt I would sub to ST.

 

[Jimbo]

None of the people who got it free last year are slotted to get it free again. That was a bit over 1,000,000 subs. D* estimated that less than 100,000 were going to renew & pay for it. That was part of their reasoning for dropping the price.

Being a Packer fan and living in Wisconsin, all of the Packers' games are on TV. Between all of the network games, Sunday night games, Monday night games and NFL Network games, I get far more NFL than I would ever watch.

$200 is a decent price for someone who really loves a team and lives out of that team's home region. Whether I would pay it, I don't know. I would probably scan the projected broadcast schedules in my area and if I was going to be able to watch 8 to 10 games of my favorite team for free, I doubt I would sub to ST.

This is what I expected you'd say.
Seeing your favorite team is your local team, there is really no reason for you to get it, unless you want to watch other games, but as you said, most of the Big games are covered already on the Network games.

 

[cb35]

thought more about it - they are set up perfectly for just throwing in Max for free or a small upsell - they thought this out when they set $199/$299 - thinking very unlikely anyone is going to pay $299. Its smart by D* - if they really wanted to push they could probably get another $25 out of people to get the Max making it $199/$224

 

[dishcomm]

I dont like the fact that Red Zone isnt included in the 200 dollar package. You should get that automatically irregardless of what version your on, 200 or 300. After all you can get redzone (the NFL Network Version) for alot cheaper on most providers.

I have Dish, for now, and I get NFLRZ for the cost of the Sports Pack which is $7.99 per month. I theink I know why DTV subs have to pay an effective $100 for NFLRZ. Because if they could get Red Zone, ST is not necessary. I will say this with al certainty, since I have NFLRZ, save for games on national TV, I have not watched an entire football game. I wager on games and I usually participate in two or three pools. So having the NFLRZ alleviates having to switch from game to game. The "mountain' comes to me. NFLRZ is THE BOMB!!!!!

 

[Jimbo]

I have Dish, for now, and I get NFLRZ for the cost of the Sports Pack which is $7.99 per month. I theink I know why DTV subs have to pay an effective $100 for NFLRZ. Because if they could get Red Zone, ST is not necessary. I will say this with al certainty, since I have NFLRZ, save for games on national TV, I have not watched an entire football game. I wager on games and I usually participate in two or three pools. So having the NFLRZ alleviates having to switch from game to game. The "mountain' comes to me. NFLRZ is THE BOMB!!!!!

You are the EXACT person the RZ was made for along with all the fantasy stuff.

If you were a fan of a particular team, you would rather have the ST so you can watch YOUR game, provided your team isn't your local team.

 

[Ramy]

This is great news. For $200 that is a keeper price for me.