The NBA League Pass has created a new medium for fans to view NBA games, but this subscription is plagued with blackouts and high prices. It comes at a price of $199.99 a year to have access to all NBA games and $119.99 to access all the games of one team, which is far too much to pay for a service where you wont be able to watch many of the games.
The major problem with these subscriptions is the games that will be missed as a consequence of blackouts. Anyone with a video subscription will not be able to view games in their market, nationally broadcasted, or ones that are part of the playoffs.
The problem is that the rights to broadcast these games were sold to TV networks and those networks don’t want to have a convenient streaming service competing with them on their games. Because of this restriction, the NBA League pass really has no choice but to watch us suffer through these blackouts.
Many streaming services such as NBA League pass, Netflix, etc. have slowly taken away from the wide audience of cable. People who have a television service are slowly becoming more and more uncommon throughout the years even if only at a glacial pace. Due to the freedom many different streaming services and alternate cable services offer, traditional cable is declining in appeal.
“At the same time, overall viewing of traditional TV is continuing its slow decline.” Victor Luckerson said in a 2014 TIME magazine article. “The average person watched about 141 hours of live television per month in the third quarter of 2014, compared to 147 hours in the third quarter of 2013,”
Not only are less people buying cable services, but these very people are constantly watching less TV. Due to the availability to watch anything whenever they want, streaming services such as Hulu and Netflix have skyrocketed in their viewership. Whereas the NBA League pass does not feel the same effects because it unintentionally negates this effect with it’s blackouts.
Some people are finding ways to avoid these blackouts. They use VPN applications to make it look like their location is outside the country or in an area where the game they’re trying to watch is not blacked out.
“This is leading to a lot of people trying to set up a VPN to trick the service into thinking you're living outside the Houston area.” Chris Brantner said in a 2016 Houston Chronicle article. “Unfortunately, it's likely breaking the terms of service on NBA League Pass,”
NBA League Pass is an overpriced service that doesn’t offer the full NBA experience due to the plague of blackouts. It is the highest priced streaming service offered by a major sports league, and a huge revenue source for the NBA. Consumers that purchase the NBA League Pass should not have to pay for this subscription and be affected by blackouts; however, if you’re willing to bypass the terms of use then you may want to consider subscribing.
Authored By: Anamul Hoque and Charles Dicus
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