It didn't hit the ground. That is the most important thing you can say about the game. Like the House of The Dragon premiere, Amazon didn't collapse. During the Super Bowl, CBS All Access crashed. It streamed better than the satellite TV company did. There were some reports of buffering and blocky resolution, but in the end, Amazon stuck with it and aired a football game.
I got the sense that the only goal of Amazon was to air a football game. The choice of cast, the style of programming, and even the location of the broadcast were all the same. Al Michaels, who was hired by Amazon to call these games, said he wasn't going to change anything. We aren't.
Amazon is paying $1 billion a year for exclusive rights to the games of the National Football League. Amazon has streamed football before, but its new package is more expensive and stakes are higher. Amazon told advertisers to expect 12 million viewers, which would make it bigger than House of the Dragon, but we won't know the real numbers for a while. If you were rooting for the death of expensive cable bundles, you would be rooting for Amazon to pull it off. It did.
There was little fanfare in the hour leading up to the game. Charissa Thompson said "welcome to the long-awaited debut of Thursday Night Football on Prime Video" but she was barely audible from the center of the crowd. The whole thing was very similar to a football game.
The Prime logo was in the top-right corner, the players used the swoopy-arrow logo in promotional segments, and there was a prompt to ask who led the league.
About 45 minutes into the broadcast, we had our first glimpse of Jeff Bezos, who was laughing on the sideline while wearing a green polo. I saw him again during the game. There is a contractually obligated number of Bezos shots. I hope it is many.
There were a lot of ads in the area.
The ads were the most noticeable of the things. Lord of The Rings: The Rings of Power is a show on Prime Video that Amazon would very much like you to watch, along with plugs for seemingly every other show and movie.
It's possible that Amazon had spare ad inventory to fill with its own stuff, but it also wouldn't be surprising if the company is happy to not make any money from the broadcast. Amazon says its investment in the National Football League could be much bigger than ad revenue. It is clear that Prime wants to grow more than it does.
Live streaming is more unpredictable than cable because it depends on a number of factors. The internet had its share of complaints, but it worked well for me.
I used my Fire TV Stick to watch the broadcast because the dream of 4K sports is just a dream. Through my crappy TV speakers it sounded like Amazon has some mixing work to do. Sometimes it felt like the game was being played in front of a large group of people, but I could not hear the players clearly.
I used to flip over to the alternate broadcast during the game. The future of sports is being covered by alternate broadcasts. It would be great if you could choose to watch the game with the commentators of your choice.
The group of trick-shot athletes who have become internet sensations were featured on Amazon. The audience was welcomed to the group's first live broadcast ever by Tyler Toney, who said "This will be the longest continuous piece of Dude Perfect video in the history of ever" They were cut off by the end of the show and an ad break after they started talking about the challenges they were going to do.
Prime Video offered the game with a broadcast in Spanish, as well as a broadcast with the always-on view of Amazon's Next Gen Stats, which was great. When you watch a broadcast like this, you learn that Amazon likes to brand everything in sight, and most of the names sound too similar. While the game plays on silent in the background, the broadcast was more like hanging out with your friends. It's enjoyable. It isn't a football show.
Amazon has an X-Ray menu that is active. There was a handy list of bios for every player on either team. It was all the information you would need to find it on the screen.
I gave up on all the alternate broadcasts and went back to Al Michaels. Amazon didn't take a lot of risks on the in-game broadcast. It's true, none, in fact. The on-screen bug with the scores and time was busy for me, but it was as crazy as Amazon got. There was a line at the beginning of the game.
I was expecting a lot more from Amazon during the game. I was expecting to be able to click here to buy this jersey and get everything I saw in the commercial. I assumed that the sideline reporter would be asking the coaches questions about how they motivate their players. There is a Ring doorbell camera snapping security footage. I would like a pop-up telling me to order now and my Whole Foods delivery will be here at halftime. There were a lot of deals around the game, but they weren't shown in the broadcast. I don't want any of those things, and they all would make the experience worse. I'm glad Amazon didn't do it.
There are at least 14 more games this year and nine more years worth after that for Amazon. Amazon will experiment more with how to air the game and how to make money from it. Amazon is streaming a football game. It's a good start.
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