In my last post, I talked about how streaming of NFL games on Amazon increased in 2017, well Amazon looks to increase footprint in sports with NBA’s G-League on Twitch. If you don’t know, Twitch is a video-streaming platform that is owned by Amazon. Starting this season, the NBA will showcase 6 G-League games per week by streaming them on Twitch. Previously, Twitch has been widely known for streaming video game action but has now expanded into other mediums such as sports. This is just another example of what viewing sports online might look like in the future.
Author: Anthony
Streaming of NFL Games on Amazon Increased in 2017
As more and more people cut the cable cord, the rise of television streaming has grown in popularity. The 2017 NFL season marked the first season of a partnership between Amazon and the league for streaming Thursday Night Football games. With one season now in the books, Amazon is reportedly looking to build of it’s first successful season, where they say viewership of the Thursday Night Game on Amazon Prime rose 17%.
Amazon Prime took over streaming the Thursday Night NFL games from Twitter. In their first season, they built on the audience Twitter had in 2016 with the averaging per-minute audience for the 11 games hitting 310,000, which equals the 17% increase from Twitter’s numbers.
Athletes Use Virtual Reality in Rehabilitation
You can experience almost anything in virtual reality. You can travel around the world. Even the Minnesota Vikings launched a virtual reality app with Oculus to engage with their fans and put them right in the middle of the action. The Vikings even incorporated into quarterback Teddy Bridgewater’s rehabilitation process. Bridgewater suffered a gruesome and had not played in a game since the 2016 preseason. The had a totally different offense scheme, so to get practice reps while he was rehabbing, he utilized the team’s virtual reality system to stay up to date with the new offensive scheme.
College Football Playoff Payouts
As I was watching last Monday night’s College Football National Championship Game between Alabama and Georgia, I found myself wondering how much these schools and raking in financially from being in the game. After doing some research, I found out that the school doesn’t receive the financial windfall directly, as there was no additional compensation for the school competing in the national title game. Win or lose, Alabama and Georgia have already each earned $6 million for the respective conferences simply by playing in the the four-team College Football Playoff.
Minnesota Vikings Launch Virtual Reality App
Millions of people watch sporting events, especially the NFL. It is reported that in 2016, viewership averaged 16.5 million people watching each game. NFL stadiums have a seating capacity for a fraction of their fan base, for example, the Minnesota Vikings new stadium, U.S. Bank Stadium, can seat exactly 66,655 spectators. A big number, but it is only a fraction of their fan base. Teams understand this and are always looking for innovative ways to make the in-stadium experience more enjoyable. The Minnesota Vikings have come up with a new marketing tool to bringing fans “inside” the stadium, as they will become the first NFL team to launch a virtual reality (VR) application for Oculus.
Economic Impact of the National Championship Game in Atlanta
The College Football Playoff National Championship game won’t kick off until Monday night, and I have to say that ESPN has been the big winner of revenue with a lot of the bowl games on their network. Plus, the number of corporate sponsors and advertisers who paid millions of dollars to showcase their brand during college footballs biggest game. Outside of the Super Bowl, this has become one of the more prestigious sporting events. Not only that, the game will be huge in terms of economic impact for the city of Atlanta.
It has been reported that previous National Championship games have generated $100 million for the host cities. Even with this years’ National Championship game an essential home game for the University of Georgia, I don’t see why it wouldn’t generate that much for the City of Atlanta. This is a major event and big time event like this is great for cities to showcase themselves. This type of atmosphere has given Atlanta the opportunity to show off their city to people who have previously visited and encourage some people who haven’t been to Atlanta to visit.