Streaming College Football Simplified

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IN THIS ISSUE:

  • ⚽ Streaming games go back to school

  • 💸 Peacock gets deals today; Big Ten next season

  • 🕺 The Savannah Bananas get down at home plate

The Main Event: Streaming College Football Simplified

Let’s simplify streaming college football.

There are college football games that stream exclusively online through major streaming services like ESPN+ and Peacock. Some college games are on smaller services like HBCUGo for SWAC football. The right service is the one with your favorite team, but for most people ESPN+ is the best option for exclusive streaming games. For $9.99 a month, ESPN+ has

  • 15-20 exclusive streaming games each weekend

  • Games featuring ranked teams

  • Games from major conferences, including the SEC and ACC

Still, the biggest college football games all season long will be on broadcast and cable channels, so big fans who want to stream will need a live TV streaming service. Which one is the best for college football?

The best live TV streaming service for college football is the one that has the most college football game channels for the best value. I created a chart that shows which live TV stream services carry each of the 18 channels that regularly have college football games.

Credit Roy Delgado (Thanks to readers for updates)

Sling TV is too complicated. If you want good college football coverage, you need the Orange + Blue Plan with Sports Extra for $65 and you'd still miss major channels.

YouTube TV has great coverage for $65 a month. They are rumored to be adding Mosaic Mode, a feature to watch four channels at the same time. That would be a BIG plus for college sports fans.

Hulu with Live TV also has great coverage for $70 a month. This price includes ESPN+, which is an excellent plus for even more streaming games.

FuboTV and DirecTV Steam are both too expensive for this sport. They can only equal YouTube TV or Hulu Live by bumping up to plans for $81 - $90 a month Skip em.

Vidgo is a new option for me, and offers good value at $60 a month. But with no NBC, CBS or CBSSN, it misses too many big games to save only $5-10 over other options.

The best way to stream college football is Hulu with Live TV. It is really close between them and YouTube TV. Hulu gets the edge by including the right channels and ESPN+, which is normally $10 a month on its own.

Hulu with Live TV will give college football fans more games than they could handle streaming for less than cable. Best of all, if you want to save money, know that you can cancel after the season is over. Knowledge is Good!

The Fast Break:

🏈 Black Friday NFL Football to Amazon in 2023?

The NFL continues to move deeper into streaming with a new streaming exclusive game starting as soon as next season. John Ourand of Sports Business Journal reports that Amazon will stream a Black Friday NFL game in 2023.

  • Amazon may pay NFL $100 million for this one game

  • NFL adds a game to a day usually associated with college football

  • Black Friday game would be sixth national game of Thanksgiving weekend (Three on Thanksgiving + SNF + MNF + Black Friday)

Amazon already dominates Black Friday for shopping, so this is the perfect match. It could also be a first step towards more Friday Night NFL in future seasons.

💸Peacock deal a big savings for sports fans

Peacock has long had a big collection of streaming sports, and now it has a deal good enough to entice new fans. New subscribers can add Peacock for $1.99 a month (regularly $4.99) or $19.99 a year (regularly $49.99), per SlickDeals.

  • The promo code for $1.99 a month is SEPTEMBER

  • The promo code for $19.99 a year is ONEYEAR

Peacock has been steadily adding new exclusive sports to the service along with streaming all of the sports from NBC. This deal could be great for fans of many sports, but it’s a fantastic deal for soccer fans with Premier League exclusives and Spanish Language live streaming of the 2022 World Cup.

  • Sunday Night NFL Football

  • MLB Sunday game

  • Notre Dame College Football

  • Premier League

  • World Cup 2022 en espanol

  • Golf

  • NASCAR & Indycar

  • Tennis

  • Olympics

  • WWE and more

👨‍🎓 Big Ten games streaming on Peacock starting 2023

The new Big Ten media deals with Fox, CBS and NBC also includes exclusive football games streaming on Peacock starting in 2023.

  • Peacock will have eight exclusive streaming Big Ten football games each season

  • Peacock will also stream simulcasts of 14-16 NBC Big Ten football games a year, including the 2026 Big Ten championship game

  • Paramount Plus will stream simulcasts of 7-15 CBS Big Ten football games too

Does this mean that the Peacock exclusive games will be trash match-ups, while the networks get all the good games? That’s unlikely according to Bill Shea’s excellent story about Big Ten on Peacock over on The Athletic.

Games are chosen via a lottery with Fox and CBS, and Peacock’s VP Rick Cordella says they plan to work with the Big Ten to position good match-ups and make the streaming games a long term appealing option.

📺Bally Sports Networks up for sale soon?

Another big scoop for John Ourand of Sports Business Journal, as he reports that Bally Sports Network owner Diamond Sports Group has hired two investment banks

This move has led many experts to speculate that they are preparing the company for sale or even bankruptcy. That includes their brand new streaming service Bally Sports+. Jared Newman of Cord Cutter Weekly just covered Bally Sports+ expanding to all 19 of their markets just this week.

Regional Sports Networks are a dying business for several reasons we discuss regularly. The only way they could survive long term is being owned by the teams that they broadcast. Big teams like the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox already own their RSNs. The best case scenario here is that MLB, NBA, NHL or some joint effort between them scoops this up soon.

Watch. Learn. Stream.

I Watched:

  • Preseason NFL football and College Football week 0 games

  • Serena Williams winning her 2022 U.S. Open Round 1 match. Stunning play, and great shoes.

  • Leon Edwards kicking Kamaru Usman into outer space to win the UFC Welterweight title with one minute remaining. This is what makes combat sports so special. There is no 21 point touchdown or 12 run home run or 15 point basket, but in boxing or MMA you can knock a guy out all the way up to the last second.

I Learned:

I’ll Be Streaming: 

  • More U.S. Open, especially more Serena Williams

  • WNBA Semi-final series with Sun vs. Sky and Storm vs. Aces

  • No. 11 Oregon vs. No. 3 Georgia on Saturday on ABC. Grab a live TV streaming service, or just break out the old antenna!

Gratitude

Thank you for reading this week’s Streaming Sports Newsletter. I really appreciate everyone sticking with me as I have had to deal with some family health issues. I hope this issue puts me back on a regular schedule again.

Do you have any questions? Reach out with a reply email or on Twitter. Your questions and ideas could become topics for future issues.

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Remember that you can reach me on Twitter @royd77 or by replying to this email at [email protected]