Football is as American as apple pie. It’s how many of us learn that hard work, talent, and teamwork are the keys to success. It’s where we get together with family and friends to tailgate and cheer on our favorite teams. But as the NFL playoffs kick into high gear, a media merger is looming that could make the gameday experience more miserable and expensive for American families. That’s because the woke clowns that run Disney, who have spent the last decade waging war on America’s values, are seeking federal approval to acquire NFL Redzone and the NFL Network, and with it the right to cram a political agenda down our throats. If federal regulators are smart, they will block this anticompetitive merger.
Here’s what happened: In August, ESPN and the NFL announced an agreement that would hand control of the NFL Network and NFL Redzone programming to ESPN. The deal is subject to approval by federal regulators. This came on the heels of Disney’s acquisition of Fubo TV, the sports-focused streaming service popular with cord-cutters.
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Disney’s intentions are clear: It wants to use its massive asset advantage to corner the market on football coverage in America so that it can bleed its competitors dry in negotiations for broadcast rights. It’s a Hail Mary for ESPN, a network that ran out of good ideas years ago, and decided to forgo profit in favor of scolding its audience for being insufficiently committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion. It was that decision that sent viewers scrambling for any other platform offering normal sports talk.
But instead of abandoning the radical political and social agenda that sent viewers running for the hills and returning to its lighthearted roots, ESPN is leveraging its sufficient financial resources to degrade the fan experience and recapture the market by force. ESPN has adopted a business model that one Barstool Sports writer summed up perfectly: “If you can’t beat them, buy them. And once you buy them, break them.” Imagine your favorite NFL pregame show transformed into a platform for late-night host Jimmy Kimmel to lambast President Donald Trump, or longform features on singer Bad Bunny’s “courageous” Super Bowl performance, honoring queer icons.”
None of this is hypothetical. Football fans spent this whole season getting a taste of what ESPN’s mismanagement style looks like. NFL Redzone was beloved by subscribers for providing commercial-free scoring updates from around the league, an awesome channel flip option for fantasy football fanatics, gamblers, and anyone seeking respite from a commercial break. Under ESPN’s management, the popular platform slowly added more commercials, rendering it somewhat pointless and demoralizing hardcore football fans who spoke out on X, Reddit, and other platforms.
If the declining quality of content is not enough, families can also expect this proposed merger to affect rates across streaming services, given Disney’s approach following these acquisitions. When Disney acquired Fubo TV, a streaming service popular with sports fans who had cut the cord, it promptly embarked on a renegotiation blitz with competitors. As Jeremiah Poff outlined in the Washington Examiner, the network pulled ESPN and ABC from competitor YouTube TV, culminating in a two-week blackout of college and professional football that enraged fans across the country. It was so bad that ESPN personality Pat McAfee publicly criticized the network’s treatment of fans who just wanted to watch the game. Fubo TV also promptly dropped NBC from its platform after the acquisition, making it impossible for subscribers to watch nationally televised Sunday Night Football games without adding another streaming platform. It’s easy to see how this benefits Disney’s bottom line. It’s hard to see how it benefits consumers, who will be forced to pay more out of pocket for substandard coverage served up alongside political rants from far-left Disney personalities.
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The American public deserves better, and the Department of Justice would be smart to recognize that this sort of consolidation is bad for consumers. A competitive marketplace leads to better outcomes for fans by driving networks and streamers to offer a better product. In fact, ESPN was once a great American success story, a Connecticut startup that redefined how we watched sports and captured the attention of a generation of Americans who tuned in religiously to SportsCenter and read Bill Simmons columns.
But those days are long gone, and in the last decade, the media marketplace has exploded, with streamers and networks all competing for a piece of the pie. Legacy entities that gave up on catering to consumers years ago should not be rewarded simply because they are sitting on a big pile of cash. In the interest of fans and the league, the Trump administration should reject this anticompetitive, unholy woke alliance.
Terry Schilling is the executive director at American Principles Project. Follow him on Twitter @Schilling1776.
