NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said this week that the league could rework its television packages when it negotiates its next media rights deal, telling CNBC the league is actively evaluating how games are bundled and sold as viewing habits keep shifting toward streaming. He made the comments from Melbourne, Australia, ahead of the NFL's first-ever regular-season game there.
The league holds an opt-out clause at the end of the 2029-30 season that lets it resell and redistribute its media rights before the current agreements would otherwise run their full course. Goodell's comments are the clearest signal yet that the NFL intends to use that opt-out not just to renew existing deals at higher prices, but to potentially restructure who gets what and how.
"One of the things we're doing as a league is talking to our partners, talking to future partners, potential partners ... and evaluating" whether to change how packages are structured, Goodell said, according to CNBC's Alex Sherman. That framing — current partners, future partners, and potential partners in the same sentence — suggests the field of bidders and rights-holders could look different next time around.
The current NFL media landscape is a patchwork built up over two decades: CBS and Fox split the AFC and NFC Sunday afternoon packages, NBC holds Sunday Night Football, ESPN/ABC carries Monday Night Football, and Amazon has Thursday Night Football exclusively on Prime Video. Layered on top are Peacock- and Paramount+-exclusive games and the NFL's own streaming ventures like NFL+.
That structure was built for a linear-first world. Goodell's comments acknowledge what's been obvious to media executives for years: younger viewers increasingly watch football through streaming apps rather than antenna or cable, and the next rights deal will need to reflect that reality rather than bolt streaming onto a legacy broadcast framework.
Rebundling could mean several things in practice — from selling more windows exclusively to streamers, to breaking up the current network-by-network split entirely, to creating new tiered or regional packages that let the NFL sell the same inventory to more buyers at once. Any of those paths would change how billions of dollars in annual rights fees get allocated across the industry.
The stakes are enormous. NFL media rights are the single largest and most reliable revenue stream in American professional sports, underwriting the salary cap, franchise valuations, and the economics of every other league that negotiates its own deals in the NFL's shadow. A restructured NFL package would ripple into how the NBA, MLB, and NHL price their own next-generation rights deals.
It also matters for the networks and streamers currently holding NFL packages. CBS, Fox, NBC, Disney/ESPN, and Amazon have each built strategic bets around their existing NFL windows; a rebundled deal could force some of them to pay significantly more to keep what they have, or open the door for platforms like Netflix or YouTube to enter at scale for the first time.
Goodell did not commit to specifics, and the opt-out is still years away. But the fact that the league is publicly floating structural change this far ahead of the deadline signals it wants incumbents and prospective bidders alike to start planning — and bidding — for a different kind of NFL media landscape well before the current deals expire.
Why it matters
The NFL's media rights are the single largest revenue engine in American sports; any rebundling ahead of the 2029-30 opt-out could reshape how much CBS, Fox, NBC, ESPN, Amazon and others pay — and who even gets a package at all.
Builder angle
What to watch next
Sources
- CNBC: NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell says league could rework TV packages Primary source with Goodell quotes and opt-out clause details
- Awful Announcing: Roger Goodell hints at reworked NFL game packages Additional context and framing