Twitter Gets Deal to Stream NFL Thursday Games--2nd Update

By Joshua Jamerson

Twitter Inc. has received the global rights to stream the National Football League's Thursday night games online, the league said Tuesday in a push to make more games available to cord-cutters and globally.

Twitter will stream the 10 Thursday Night Football games broadcast by NBC and CBS, which also will be simulcast on NFL Network. The league said the arrangement allows the games to be seen on broadcast television, cable television and digitally.

Under the agreement, Twitter also will be able to show in-game highlights from Thursday Night Football and pregame Periscope broadcasts from players and teams. Periscope is the live-streaming video app that Twitter acquired last year.

"There is a massive amount of NFL-related conversation happening on Twitter during our games," NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said in prepared remarks. Mr. Goodell made the first public announcement Tuesday morning in a tweet, which was accompanied by a video compilation of football highlights. It was Mr. Goodell's first tweet since September 2014.

The NFL in February reached an agreement with CBS and NBC to carry five Thursday games each. Selling streaming rights to Thursday games won't affect CBS and NBC's rights to offer the games online to their pay-TV subscribers, and executives for both networks said they didn't believe the Thursday streaming would cut into their audiences.

The league has teased the idea of a partnership with an Internet company for years, with its boldest step coming in October, when Yahoo won a bid for the league's first streaming-only broadcast, a game between the Buffalo Bills and Jacksonville Jaguars. The event was an experiment for the NFL, which wanted to see how viewers, advertisers and technology companies would respond to games on digital platforms. The Yahoo game drew 2.36 million viewers.

Twitter has sought to be a bigger player in live events. Last year, Twitter bid on the right to stream the October game but lost out to Yahoo, The Wall Street Journal reported. Also last year Twitter launched its curated news feature "Moments," in which editors highlight top tweets about live events.

Twitter executives hope the emphasis on live events will help them better answer an existential question the microblogging service has faced: Why use Twitter?

Twitter has been emphasizing its strength in live content since co-founder Jack Dorsey returned to the helm in October. While Twitter's 320 million active user base is smaller than competitors such as Facebook Inc., its fast-paced nature has made it the unrivaled place for live content such as sports highlights and breaking news.

Twitter hopes nabbing the rights to exclusive content will make it an even more desirable destination for people as these live events unfold, which the company hopes in the long run will help reinvigorate its stalled user growth.

"People watch NFL games with Twitter today," said Jack Dorsey, Twitter's chief executive. "Now they'll be able to watch right on Twitter Thursday nights."

Last year, Twitter and the NFL signed a two-year deal that enabled the social-media service to distribute highlights and other content.

Write to Joshua Jamerson at joshua.jamerson@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 05, 2016 09:36 ET (13:36 GMT)

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