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Home / Sports / TV & Streaming
TV & Streaming: who broadcasts what
Sports media rights have become some of the most valuable contracts in entertainment — here's who holds them.
Leagues Equipment Betting TV & Streaming College Conferences
DirecTV remains a major carrier of premium sports packages
DirecTV continues to be one of the primary distributors for out-of-market sports packages and premium sports tiers, competing with streaming-only options as the industry shifts. Its commercial and residential distribution remains central to how bars, restaurants, and sports fans access out-of-market games not available through basic cable or streaming alone.
Congress is weighing a plan to bundle all college football rights together
A proposal to consolidate FBS broadcast rights across all conferences could more than double the current combined media value of roughly $3.5 billion annually, according to a study commissioned by the American Athletic Conference. The SEC and Big Ten — who together are projected to roughly double the media revenue of the ACC and Big 12 over the next decade under their current separate deals — are actively lobbying Congress to reject the plan, since consolidation would likely redistribute value away from the two biggest conferences toward smaller ones.
ESPN's 2026 college football coverage spans nine networks
ESPN's 2026-27 season coverage runs across ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, SEC Network, ACC Network, ESPN+, SEC Network+, and ACCNX, with more than 1,000 games total and every game streaming on the ESPN App — reflecting how thoroughly college football rights have fragmented across linear and streaming simultaneously rather than consolidating onto one platform.
The NFL is facing real regulatory pressure over its streaming shift
Heading into the 2026-27 season, the NFL is defending its media-rights strategy against genuine political and regulatory scrutiny — the FCC opened an inquiry into broadcast sports rights after Chairman Brendan Carr criticized the league over the cost and complexity of finding and watching NFL games, President Trump has separately raised similar complaints, and the Department of Justice opened a probe in April 2026 into the NFL's antitrust exemption, which allows the league to negotiate media deals collectively rather than team-by-team. The league's defense, made by NFL COO Hans Schroeder: the current mix of broadcast and streaming — including an expanded Netflix deal carrying five games, YouTube's Sunday Ticket rights, and Amazon's Thursday Night Football package — is "the most fan-friendly model there is of any sport" for distribution. Whether regulators agree remains a genuinely open question as the season plays out.
Source: Deadline / TVTechnology →
Broadcast & Streaming Directory
DirecTV
Premium & commercial sports distribution
ESPN
Parent: The Walt Disney Company
Fox Sports
Parent: Fox Corporation
CBS Sports
Parent: Paramount Skydance
NBC Sports / Peacock
Parent: Comcast (NBCUniversal)
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