Sports Streaming Outrage Meter: MNF ESPN+ Exclusive Edition

Welcome back to another edition of the Awful Anncreasing Sports Streaming Outrage Meter, where we attempt to quantify how inconvenient and annoying streaming exclusives are for fans and audiences. We rate each streaming annoyance in four categories on a scale of 1 to 25 (1 means not that annoying/inconvenient/frustrating, 25 means extremely annoying/inconvenient/frustrating). The highest possible score would be 100.

It's happening again. Another NFL game available exclusively on a streaming service.

Earlier this season we had the Green Bay-Pittsburgh game from Brazil on Peacock on opening weekend. This time, ESPN+ is getting one Monday Night Football Nightcap as part of a doubleheader.

In the last two seasons, there have been two MNF doubleheaders split between ESPN and ABC, regardless of whether one game was scheduled at 7:30 p.m. ET and the other in the regular timeslot at 8:15 p.m. ET. For this week 7 Monday Night Football Twin-Bill, ESPN and ABC will simulcast Baltimore and Tampa Bay at 8:15 p.m. ET, with Game 2 between the Los Angeles Chargers and Arizona Cardinals available to stream exclusively on ESPN+. While ESPN+ has hosted its exclusive game in London for the past two seasons, this is the first time it's taking place there Monday Night Football.

Last season, NBC and Peacock played a linear/streaming doubleheader in both the regular season and Wild Card Weekend, giving fans plenty to complain about.

The commercials for this are so funny: They exaggerate the ESPN+ exclusivity, as if Monday Night Football wouldn't be on TV for free for 35 years. Don't piss me off and call it streaming. https://t.co/jm7BPZGORk

— Robert Breedlove (@Breedlovecam) October 21, 2024

While ESPN heavily promoted tonight's doubleheader game, viewers likely won't know that the Chargers-Cardinals are behind the dreaded paywall. Here's our take on how disruptive this will be.

How we got here

In 2021, ESPN announced a new 10-year deal with the National Football League that included three weeks of MNF doubleheaders and an exclusive game for ESPN+. The key was that it would come from the NFL's international inventory in either London or Germany, as the original press release stated:

A highlight of ESPN's expanded regular season package will be an annual exclusive national game on ESPN+, the industry-leading sports streaming service. The game will be played internationally and will be broadcast live in the Sunday morning ET window. Additionally, this agreement provides ESPN the ability to simulcast all ESPN/ABC game telecasts on ESPN+.

In addition to the one game for the streaming platform, ESPN+ received highlight rights, allowing NFL Primetime to return after a fifteen-year absence.

As previously mentioned, ESPN's three-week doubleheaders would allow games on both ESPN and ABC. However, with the NFL having already completed its London schedule this season and only having one more international game in Germany in Week 10, all scheduled for NFL Network, there was no room for ESPN+. In doing so, the NFL ensured that the streaming service would get one game per season in this final MNF doubleheader of the year.

Over the past two seasons, many have simply ignored the ESPN+ competition, knowing that the London game was not typically a marquee game and many fans were often still asleep, at church or unaware it was even happening. Maybe that's why the exclusive game has now been postponed to Monday evening, where fans are very attentive and interested.

Course of event transmission/extent of harassment

I love how ESPN is promoting the Chargers-Cardinals Monday Night Football game exclusively on ESPN+

Yes, we are all very excited about another streaming service!

— Joe DiTullio (@DiTullioJoe) October 15, 2024

Monday Night Football dates back to 1970, when it started out as a novelty for ABC but quickly became a ratings juggernaut within weeks of the new package's launch. In 2006, the package moved to cable television with ESPN's takeover, largely keeping it off broadcast television until last year when it was used to support ABC during the writers' and actors' strike. It will be reinstated this season despite some weaker ratings.

However, this is the first time that a Monday Night FootballThe game will be streamed exclusively.

This marks the end of six decades of broadcasting games on linear television, whether broadcast or cable. ESPN has had NFL games on ESPN+ before, so it's not entirely new, just new to Monday Night Football.

With that in mind, we will do this 15 out of a possible 25 points because this is very annoying, especially for those who don't realize it until they try to tune in, but there is at least one game tonight that doesn't require a streaming service.

You get your Monday night drink, but no dessert.

What is the ransom?

ESPN+ costs $11.99 per month or $119.99 annually. That's a lot. It can be part of the Disney streaming package Disney+ and Hulu and costs $14.99 per month with ads or $24.99 per month ad-free on Hulu and Disney+. As ESPN prepares a standalone service, expect even higher costs. With parent company Disney placing an emphasis on streaming, the move away from cable and broadcast has become even more prominent.

The cost of this and other programming, be it college sports, exclusive original content, MLB, NHL or NBA, is quite high. This is a pretty big win for consumers.

If you don't have the Disney package and are in a pinch, $11.99 isn't great, but Unlike other ransoms, it is digestible. We'll give this one 10 out of 25.

Broadcast quality

This is ESPN. Even if this Chargers-Cardinals game moves to streaming, the world leader won't skimp on quality. The NFL has standards and requires broadcast quality production. If you watch this game on your personal device or a set-top box like Apple TV+, you won't see anything cheap.

We score 2 of 25 Here the hassle will be minimal.

ROI

When you watch an event on ESPN+ for the first time, the company hopes you'll stick around for others, too.

As ESPN+ grows, you'll see Disney continue to look for more content to give the beast more rights in the future. Currently, ESPN+ is more of a niche offering. Some of the reasons people are signing up now include low-level college football games, NHL, Olympic sports and NCAA championships, and UFC events.

From the list below, do you see yourself sticking with this lineup outside of today's game?

The 30 for 30 Catalogs and a slew of other originals (hello, Omaha Productions) also give you some binge-watching options if you're interested. If you are a fan of sports documentaries and haven't seen much of it 30 for 30s, you can probably earn a lot of miles if you subscribe to ESPN+ for the game and then bag a handful or more of excellent documents within a month. You'll also get access to more written context on the ESPN website if you want that, although the entire value proposition changes.

Ultimately, how good is this service for your $12 a month? We have to assume that if you don't already have ESPN+ and are just signing up now, you probably won't see much else on the service.

Despite our appreciation for the 30 for 30s, this isn't the most robust offering. We'll go with one 21 of 25 Score.

Final result

The total number of points is 47 out of 100 on the anger scale.

The very first Monday Night Football The streaming game is undoubtedly annoying, but it costs $12 and you can still watch football tonight even if you don't choose to sign up for that game.

There are many, many, many worse offenders.

Still, it's pretty annoying!

You can read our previous sports streaming outreach meter for Fubo UEFA Euro 2024 here.