Category: Media

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Modern TV: Everything to Watch, Nothing Worth Watching

Modern TV

A sarcastic look at reality TV, endless reboots, and how modern television forgot how to make us laugh.

We live in the golden age of television. Modern TV delivers hundreds of channels, dozens of streaming services, and enough programming to occupy a person from birth until the end of universe. Yet somehow, I can spend 30 minutes scrolling through menus before announcing there’s absolutely nothing worth watching.

Humanity has placed a television studio in virtually every pocket, developed algorithms capable of predicting our behavior, and made entertainment available anywhere on Earth. Yet apparently, nobody can figure out how to make a decent half-hour sitcom. I’m not asking for Shakespeare. Sometimes I just want a goofy character, a ridiculous misunderstanding, and a punchline that makes me laugh hard enough to snort whatever I’m drinking. Preferably without requiring me to apologize to the furniture.

Reality Television: Making Stupidity a Renewable Resource

Somewhere in Hollywood, an executive discovered that hiring professional actors and competent writers costs money. Why bother when you can put twelve people with questionable judgment in a house and encourage them to behave like unsupervised toddlers? And thus, reality television conquered civilization.

We have strangers marrying strangers, wealthy people arguing with other wealthy people, and contestants competing for romantic relationships with individuals they probably wouldn’t speak to at a bus stop. Every episode features someone crying in a bathroom, a dramatic confrontation, and at least one person declaring, “I’m just being real.” No, you’re being obnoxious. There’s a difference.

And why are we supposed to enjoy watching people humiliate themselves or each other? Prank shows are particularly baffling. Frightening an unsuspecting person, ruining their afternoon, and shouting “It’s just a prank!” doesn’t suddenly make the behavior clever. It makes you the reason warning labels exist.

I prefer comedy where everyone gets to laugh together. Nobody needs to cry, call an attorney, or issue a public apology afterward. A little silliness, a terrible impression, or the ridiculous convergence circumstances can accomplish the same thing without requiring a psychological evaluation.

Cooking Competitions: Because Apparently Your Taste Buds Are Wrong

I enjoy food. I eat it several times a day, sometimes when I’m not even hungry. I consider myself reasonably qualified on the subject. What I don’t understand is why watching someone else prepare food I cannot taste is entertainment.

And apparently, cooking and baking must now be competitive sports. Three celebrity chefs solemnly declare that one person’s chocolate soufflé is superior because it possesses a more sophisticated flavor profile. According to whom? Perhaps I don’t like truffles. Perhaps lavender belongs in soap rather than dessert. Perhaps I prefer my steak without a decorative smear of something resembling finger paint. Taste is subjective, regardless of how expensive the judge’s culinary education was.

Then there’s presentation. A contestant spends four hours preparing dinner, only to be criticized because the garnish fails to communicate a coherent artistic vision. It’s a pork chop, not a Renaissance fresco.

The baking competitions are worse. Someone constructs a six-foot Eiffel Tower out of cake, fondant, and what appears to be industrial scaffolding. The judges inspect it like a structural engineering project before announcing that the sponge is slightly dry. Perhaps that’s because the contestant spent eleven hours building a suspension bridge out of frosting.

And the same absurdity extends to dancing and runway competitions. Technical skills can be evaluated, certainly, but whether a performance is moving or an outfit is beautiful remains personal preference. Yet a handful of industry insiders pronounce their opinions as though they’ve discovered universal truth. Meanwhile, I’m sitting at home thinking the dress resembles a shower curtain and the dancer appears to be having a medical emergency. But what do I know? I haven’t been professionally trained to appreciate interpretive anguish.

HGTV: Home Improvement for Millionaires

Remember when HGTV actually taught home improvement? You could learn to replace a faucet, repair drywall, install a backsplash, or renovate a bathroom without taking out a second mortgage. You might even finish the episode knowing something useful.

Now we watch a freelance butterfly photographer and a part-time wellness consultant shopping for a $1.7 million home. They need five bedrooms, a gourmet kitchen, mountain views, and enough outdoor entertaining space to host the G7 summit. Naturally, they reject the first house because the guest bathroom has brass fixtures. Apparently, replacing a faucet is an insurmountable obstacle when you’re spending seven figures.

Then come the renovations. A perfectly functional house is purchased, and within twelve minutes, someone is swinging a sledgehammer through the kitchen. Why? Because the house has walls. Every home must now be “open concept,” resembling an airport terminal where the entire family can enjoy the sights, sounds, and smells of whatever is burning in the kitchen.

And can we please stop calling it an open concept? A concept is an idea. Once you’ve knocked down the walls and built the damn thing, it’s an open floor plan. You don’t live in a concept. You live in a house. Although, judging by some of these renovations, the concept may have been better left on paper.

Naturally, the contractor discovers a dramatic problem behind a wall. Plumbing! Electrical wiring! Structural supports! In a house! Who could possibly have anticipated this? Fortunately, the problem is resolved by adding another $85,000 to the budget.

I miss the days when home improvement meant learning how to save $200 replacing a toilet, rather than watching someone spend $200,000 relocating one. At this rate, the next HGTV series will feature a couple spending $3 million renovating a garden shed because the lawnmower deserves an open floor plan.

Whatever Happened to Just Being Funny?

Remember sitcoms? How I Met Your Mother gave us friends navigating relationships and the general stupidity of adulthood. Two and a Half Men gave us Charlie Harper, a man whose entire existence demonstrated why good judgment matters. Neither required us to reconsider our worldview. They just made us laugh.

We had Cheers, Frasier, and The King of Queens. Ordinary people making ridiculous decisions, misunderstanding each other, and occasionally learning absolutely nothing. It was glorious.

Consider how little was required. Cheers needed a bar. Seinfeld needed an apartment and a diner. Frasier needed two brothers capable of turning a cup of coffee into an international incident. Today, Hollywood apparently needs $200 million, seventeen executive producers, a cinematic universe, and a traumatic origin story to accomplish the same thing.

And when executives can’t think of something original, they reboot something we loved 25 years ago. Except now everyone is miserable, emotionally damaged, and required to deliver important speeches about contemporary society.

Imagine a modern Gilligan’s Island. Gilligan spends six episodes processing childhood trauma, the Skipper confronts his authoritarian leadership style, and the Professor delivers a passionate monologue about climate change. Meanwhile, the Minnow is still sitting on the beach because nobody bothered to fix the damn boat.

I’m not opposed to thoughtful television. MASH* and All in the Family addressed serious subjects brilliantly. But they understood that entertainment and meaningful storytelling could coexist without every episode resembling mandatory workplace training.

Sometimes I just want to laugh at something gloriously stupid. A ridiculous voice, a terrible song about a sandwich, or a grown man attempting to convince his family that the dog has been secretly running the household finances. Nobody’s being humiliated, nobody’s delivering a message, and everyone gets to laugh together. Except perhaps the dog, who has apparently been embezzling the biscuit budget.

Congratulations, You’ve Reinvented Cable

Remember when streaming was supposed to save us from expensive cable bundles and commercials? Now we subscribe to multiple services, each with its own password, pricing tiers, and mysterious collection of programming. And the commercials are back. At least cable had the decency to put everything on one bill.

Finding an old sitcom now requires an archaeological expedition through six applications, only to discover it moved to another service last Tuesday. And when I finally locate it, the television demands that I verify I’m a member of my own household.

I’m sitting in my living room, holding a remote control, surrounded by furniture I purchased, being interrogated by a television about whether I belong here. I half expect it to demand two forms of identification, a utility bill, and a notarized statement from the dog. The dog refuses to cooperate. He’s watching squirrels and considers the entire process beneath him. Frankly, I’m starting to agree with the dog.

Just Make Me Laugh

Perhaps I’m getting older. I prefer to think I’m becoming increasingly selective about how much nonsense I’m willing to tolerate. I don’t need strangers screaming at each other, another million-dollar kitchen renovation, or a beloved childhood character reimagined as a miserable shell of their former self. And I certainly don’t need every television program joining the endless cultural argument.

Give me clever sitcoms, ridiculous misunderstandings, terrible impressions, and silly songs. Give me a detective who solves crimes, a spaceship that explores the galaxy, or a game show where somebody wins a refrigerator and everyone applauds. Give me characters who are funny because they’re human, not because they’re delivering a carefully constructed message.

The world is already serious, divided, angry, and exhausting. I don’t need my television joining the argument. Sometimes I just want to sit on the couch, turn off my brain for half an hour, and laugh.

Instead, I spend 30 minutes searching for something to watch, give up, and go to bed.

At least the pillow doesn’t require a subscription.

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We Have Apparently Defeated Boredom

How We Live With Boredom While Being Entertained Constantly

The more I think about it, the phone itself probably isn’t the problem. Blaming the phone is like blaming the refrigerator because you ate an entire cheesecake. The phone was just there. It’s what we’ve put inside the phone that deserves some attention, because we have become extraordinarily good at creating things that prevent us from ever having an unoccupied moment, avoiding boredom.

TikTok may be humanity’s finest achievement in this area. TikTok doesn’t even ask what you’d like to watch. It has removed that burden from your life. You open the app and TikTok basically says, “Don’t worry. We’ve been watching you. We know what you like.” Which should be terrifying. Instead we say, “Great. Show me the raccoon.”

And TikTok does. Then another raccoon. Then a guy fixing a carburetor. Then a woman explaining a murder from 1987. Then a recipe involving cream cheese that seems medically irresponsible. Then another raccoon. At no point did you request any of this. You didn’t wake up that morning thinking, “I’d really like a nice mixture of small mammals, automotive repair, unsolved homicide and dangerous amounts of dairy.” But TikTok knew.

That’s the genius of the endless scroll. There’s no ending. Books end. Movies end. Television shows end. Concerts end. Relationships end. Eventually even a trip to IKEA ends, although by that point you’re carrying a lamp you don’t remember selecting and your marriage has been tested. The scroll just keeps going.

Instagram has a slightly different purpose. Instagram lets us keep track of all the people who are currently having a better day than we are. Apparently everyone is in Italy. I don’t know when this happened. I’ll open Instagram on a Tuesday afternoon and discover that seventeen people I know are standing somewhere along the Amalfi Coast. Was there a meeting? Did I miss an email? I’m sitting at home eating leftover chicken, and apparently everyone I’ve ever met is drinking something orange beside the Mediterranean.

And everyone looks fantastic. Nobody posts a picture from the fourth day of the vacation when the family is tired, somebody has diarrhea and Dad has become irrationally angry about the hotel parking situation. I would follow that account. That’s useful travel information.

Facebook has become something entirely different. Facebook is where you keep in touch with family, remember birthdays and discover that someone you knew briefly in 1996 has developed extremely strong opinions about things. You don’t remember this person being particularly opinionated in 1996. You barely remember this person. But apparently Kevin has done his research.

Kevin has thoughts about monetary policy now. Kevin used to eat glue. But perhaps Kevin has grown. Either way, he has prepared a fourteen-paragraph post about interest rates, and somewhere underneath it two people from your graduating class are about to stop speaking to each other.

YouTube gets me in an entirely different way because YouTube doesn’t feel like wasting time. YouTube feels educational. That’s dangerous. I’ll go to YouTube because I need to know how to fix something. This is responsible adult behavior. I type “how to replace bathroom faucet,” find a seven-minute video, and feel like a capable homeowner.

An hour later I’m watching a 54-year-old man named Steve build a log cabin in northern Idaho using tools from 1883. I don’t live in Idaho. I don’t own land in Idaho. I’ve never considered building a log cabin. But Steve is about to start the chimney, and at this point I have an emotional investment. I’m not leaving Steve now. He’s done beautiful work.

Reddit is even more dangerous because Reddit contains the answer to every question you didn’t know you had. You can type almost anything into a search engine followed by the word “Reddit” and discover that hundreds of people have already spent several years discussing it. “Why does my washing machine smell weird Reddit?” Boom. There’s your community.

Four people know exactly what’s wrong. Three insist you bought the wrong washing machine. Someone recommends vinegar. Someone else says vinegar will destroy it. Two people begin arguing about front-loading machines. Then, somehow, someone blames the government. You close Reddit knowing less than when you arrived but feeling strangely involved.

And then there are news apps. I check the news several times a day, which I tell myself is because I like to remain informed. That’s probably true the first time. By the sixth time, I’m apparently just checking whether civilization is still there. It is. Excellent. I’ll check again after lunch.

Sports apps may be worse because sports have the audacity to happen slowly. Baseball is particularly troublesome. I’ll check the Red Sox score: 3–2. I’ll put the phone down, thirty seconds will pass, and I’ll check again. Still 3–2. What did I think was going to happen? It’s baseball. The pitcher may still be looking at the catcher. Nevertheless, apparently I need visual confirmation.

But perhaps the strangest thing is that the phone itself knows exactly what we’re doing. Every week my iPhone sends me a Screen Time report, and I hate this feature. “Your screen time was up 14% last week.” I don’t remember asking for a performance review from my telephone.

It’s especially irritating because the phone was there the entire time. It participated. You can’t spend all week saying, “Hey, look at this. Somebody liked something. Breaking news. The Red Sox are losing. Someone you barely remember has a birthday,” and then show up Sunday morning wearing little imaginary glasses like an accountant. “Chris, we need to discuss your numbers.”

You were my dealer. Now you’re my therapist? The phone will even suggest that perhaps I should reduce my screen time. That’s rich. This is like a bartender sliding your eighth beer across the counter and saying, “You know, you should really think about drinking less.” Maybe I should, Gary, but you’re sending some mixed signals.

The remarkable part is that we have done all of this because, apparently, at some point we collectively decided that boredom was unacceptable. Not merely unpleasant, but something requiring immediate intervention. Waiting for the dentist? Phone. Waiting for coffee? Phone. Sitting on the toilet? Phone. Watching television? Somehow, also phone.

That last one is particularly impressive because we’re already being entertained. We’re sitting six feet away from a 65-inch television containing professional actors who have spent months and millions of dollars attempting to hold our attention, and halfway through the show our brain decides, “This is good, but I wonder what strangers are doing.”

So we check. Someone made tacos. Excellent. Back to the murder mystery. Wait, what happened? Rewind. Check the phone during the rewind. Miss it again. At some point you have to admire the efficiency.

We’ve managed to turn watching television into a task requiring two screens, three attempts and a recap from the person sitting next to us who was also on their phone. Nobody knows who killed the victim, but we all saw the tacos.

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March Madness Is Still Great—But the Format Is Showing Cracks

The NCAA March Madness tournament is the most entertaining event in American sports. That’s my view—but even if you disagree, it’s hard to deny its place as the bridge from winter into spring. March Madness delivers unmatched excitement, but beneath the buzzer beaters and Cinderella runs, the structure of college sports is increasingly shaped by television revenue—not competition.

The pageantry, heroics, and Cinderella runs create lasting stories. The emotion—raw, immediate, and often unfiltered—cements the tournament in American lore. One play, one shot, one steal can turn a teenager into a national figure overnight. As an example, in Storrs, Mullins will be remembered forever, while the name Laettner is still spoken of like a villain from a different era.

But the format, like the College Football Playoff, shows cracks. Play-in games—especially for 11 seeds—highlight a system driven less by competition and more by television inventory. More games mean more revenue. That’s the reality.

The losing team in an 11-seed play-in goes home without ever reaching the true field. Why not seed them properly as 12s? Because few would watch expanded games at the lowest seeds. And realistically, are there 68 teams capable of winning a national title?

College football faces the same question. Are there truly 12 to 16 national title contenders? No. The regular season still matters—or should. Instead, power conferences continue to consolidate programs, concentrating talent and influence. Again, television drives the structure.

March Madness remains exceptional. But selection and structure still favor large conferences—the ones that deliver ratings. Visibility, not balance, shapes the field. Sports create shared moments and common ground in ways almost nothing else can. But when revenue becomes the primary driver, the game doesn’t just change—it quietly stops being fair.

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Smell the Grass — Finding Common Ground Again

Common Ground — Essays on shared experiences that bring people together.

Common Ground — A Series Introduction

Modern life often feels defined by disagreement. Every issue becomes a debate, every moment another argument, every headline a new dividing line. Yet most people spend far more of their lives sharing ordinary experiences than fighting over differences.

This series explores those shared moments.

Sports fields, small-town stadiums, neighborhood parks, and community traditions have long created spaces where people gather simply to be present together. In those places, political labels fade, strangers become neighbors, and the common rhythms of life take center stage.

Disagreement will always exist, and that is healthy. But constant, imposed division is something different. The purpose of this series is to rediscover the quieter experiences that remind us how much we still share.

Sometimes common ground is found in big moments — a championship game, a comeback season, a dramatic final play.

More often it is found in smaller ones: the smell of freshly cut grass, the sound of a crowd settling in, a rookie making their first catch under the evening sun.

These essays are about slowing down long enough to notice those moments — and remembering that life, while often described as short, is also the longest thing any of us will ever do.

Long enough to appreciate the game.

Smell the Grass

Modern media runs on debate. Every event must produce a take, every moment a controversy, every broadcast another argument.

Disagreement itself is not the problem.

Constant division is.

There was a time when sports reminded us of something simpler — that people who disagree about many things can still sit side by side and enjoy the same moment.

The real power of sports has never lived in debate shows.

It lives in the field, the crowd, and the shared experience.

A warm evening at the ballpark.
The smell of freshly cut grass drifting through the air.
Chalk lines along the baselines.
A rookie in right field squinting into the sun waiting for the next fly ball.

Nothing dramatic is happening.

Yet something meaningful is.

For decades sports created a rhythm in everyday life. A long baseball season unfolding slowly through summer nights. Friday night football bringing a town together. Families listening on the porch or gathering around a television simply to watch the game.

These experiences were never about urgency.

They were about presence.

We often hear that life is short. That phrase pushes us to hurry, to chase the next thing.

But there is another way to look at it.

Life is also the longest thing any of us will ever do.

Which means the small moments matter.

Anyone who has played the game knows the feeling. Standing in the grass with dirt on your hands. Teammates laughing between innings. The sun beginning to set beyond the outfield fence.

And suddenly the score doesn’t matter.

The inning doesn’t matter.

All you want is for that moment to last a little longer — the grass under your cleats, the dirt on your hands, the voices of teammates and fans blending together in the background.

You are simply there.

Sports have always created spaces where division fades. In the stands no one asks who you voted for. Strangers high-five after a big play. Neighbors sit together simply enjoying the same evening.

For a few hours, everyone shares the same moment.

Today those moments often get buried beneath debate about draft picks, trades, or controversies. The games themselves — and the quiet community around them — receive less attention than the arguments.

That is unfortunate, because sports may still be one of the last places where people naturally gather around something positive.

The comeback player.
The rookie’s first big play.
The veteran chasing one last season.

These stories do not need debate panels to give them meaning. They unfold naturally on the field.

And when people watch them together, something else happens as well: we remember that we share far more than we often admit.

This essay begins a series about rediscovering that common ground.

Disagreement is part of life. It always will be.

But constant, imposed division is not.

Sometimes the best way to reconnect is simply to sit in the stands, feel the dirt between your fingers, watch the sun dip behind the stadium lights, and realize that for a few hours everyone is just enjoying the same game.

Life is short.

Life is also long.

Long enough to slow down, notice the moment, and appreciate the people around us.

Sometimes the best thing we can do is slow down.

Smell the grass.

And remember what brings us together.

Author

Chris McCarty writes about leadership, culture, and the role of sport in community life. His essays explore how shared experiences—particularly sports—can bring people together in a divided media environment.

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We Don’t Cover Sports Anymore. We Monetize Them.

Sports media used to center on competition.

Now it centers on monetization.

The shift is structural, not accidental.

A single dominant league drives massive broadcast contracts. Networks invest billions. Coverage naturally bends toward that investment — year-round, in season or not.

Meanwhile, gambling partnerships are embedded into the broadcast infrastructure. Odds scroll across screens. Studio segments are sponsored by sportsbooks. Analysts reference spreads as casually as statistics.

The game is still played.

But it is no longer the primary product.

The Single-League Echo Chamber

When one league becomes the economic engine of a network, it becomes the editorial engine too.

Its offseason dominates headlines.
Its draft speculation fills weeks of programming.
Its trade rumors eclipse actual games being played in other leagues.

Baseball pennant races.
Hockey playoffs.
International competition.

All compete for oxygen against speculative discussion about a league that may not even be in season.

That is not purely organic demand. It is reinforced importance. And over time, it narrows the national sports conversation.

Other major leagues are treated as secondary properties instead of primary competitions.

Gambling as Default Engagement

Sports betting is no longer adjacent to sports media. It is integrated into it.

Viewers are encouraged to have “action” on every game, every quarter, every possession.

The language has changed:

Not “How does this team adjust?”
But “Will this hit the over?”

This reframes why people watch.

Worse, it normalizes financial risk as entertainment. For many viewers — particularly younger ones — gambling is presented as frictionless participation.

But debt incurred on a mobile app during halftime is still debt.

When promotion is constant and disclaimers are minimal, the ethical tension is obvious.

Entertainment becomes a delivery system for financial exposure.

Speculation Over Substance

Mock drafts months in advance.
Trade rumors built on anonymous sourcing.
Daily debate about hypothetical roster moves.

Speculation now receives more sustained attention than actual competition.

A Tuesday rumor can eclipse a Saturday performance.

Traditional sports journalism once emphasized:

  • Tactical breakdowns
  • Player development
  • Investigative accountability
  • Film study

Now much of the airtime is filled with prediction, reaction, and manufactured urgency.

Speculation is cheaper to produce than analysis. It fills programming blocks. It drives engagement metrics.

But it trains fans to care more about transaction theater than execution.

What We’re Losing

When coverage prioritizes:

  • League dominance
  • Gambling integration
  • Narrative speculation

The craft of sport fades into the background.

Fans become consumers of content rather than students of the game.

And loyalty built on appreciation of skill, preparation, and competition is replaced by short-term engagement.

Sports at their best are strategic, merit-driven, and communal. They do not require constant drama or wagering prompts to be compelling.

But when monetization becomes the primary lens, the competition becomes secondary.

And when competition becomes secondary long enough, we stop loving the game.

We simply consume it.

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Football Went Streaming—and Fans Are Paying the Price

Before we go any further, a quick clarification:

This is about football.

Not medicine.
Not emergency services.
Not the distribution of clean drinking water.

No one’s life is on the line if Thursday Night Football buffers. (Tempers, maybe. Friendships, occasionally. Lives? No.)

Which makes it all the more impressive how complicated watching a football game has become.

There was a time when watching football required a television, a chair, and a strong opinion about officiating. Today, it requires an internet connection, a budget spreadsheet, multiple subscriptions, and the quiet acceptance that you are paying for the same thing several times.

The New Math of Watching One Game

To watch a single Thursday night NFL game, many fans now need:

  • High-speed internet (mandatory)
  • Amazon Prime (exclusive access)
  • Cable or a live-TV streaming service (because the rest of the league still lives there)

This is not a bundle.
It’s a subscription relay race.

Nothing replaced anything else. Cable didn’t get cheaper. Streaming didn’t simplify the experience. Another bill just quietly appeared and hoped no one would notice.

Paying More, Still Watching Commercials

After paying for internet and Prime, fans are rewarded with commercials.

Full commercial breaks. Sponsored segments. On-screen graphics politely reminding you that a corporation exists and would like your attention during third-and-long.

Traditionally, there was a tradeoff:

  • Free TV had ads
  • Paid services reduced them

Now the model is:

  • Paid services have ads
  • More paid services have… the same ads

At some point, “premium” stops meaning anything.

Streaming Doesn’t Actually Expand Access

The phrase “streaming expands access” sounds convincing until it meets reality.

Millions of Americans:

  • Lack reliable broadband
  • Live in rural areas with unstable connections
  • Are older and don’t want to troubleshoot apps for kickoff
  • Are military families relying on broadcast feeds
  • Are priced out entirely

Broadcast television solved this problem decades ago. It was free, reliable, and worked during bad weather—sometimes especially during bad weather.

Exclusive streaming narrows access. It just does so with better user interface design.

Baseball’s Local Model: Better Intent, Same Friction

Baseball offers a useful comparison.

For years, Major League Baseball leaned on Regional Sports Networks to preserve a local feel. Local announcers. Local narratives. Teams that felt tied to their cities (or in my case, all of New England) rather than national content schedules.

That part worked.

The flaws came later: expensive cable bundles, blackout rules, and fragmented subscriptions. Fans often needed multiple services just to follow one team. The access problem didn’t disappear—it evolved.

So no, baseball’s model isn’t perfect.

But the intent mattered. The goal was to keep the sport rooted locally. The NFL’s streaming exclusivity moves in the opposite direction—away from locality and toward centralized, subscription-first access.

Baseball struggled to modernize without losing its identity. Football risks skipping that struggle and losing the identity outright.

Streaming Isn’t the Villain. Exclusivity Is.

Streaming is fine. Helpful, even. Although most of the time I can’t find a single piece of engaging, original content across the myriad services, over-heating my credit card. But it offers:

  • Better production tools
  • Alternative broadcasts
  • Mobile access
  • Innovation

The problem isn’t streaming—it’s replacement.

Streaming should supplement broadcast access, not eliminate it. This isn’t a radical idea. It’s how the league operated successfully for decades.

A reasonable compromise still exists:

  • Let streaming platforms innovate and produce
  • Keep free over-the-air broadcasts in local markets
  • Preserve national simulcasts for major games

Everyone wins. Fans included.

Perspective Matters

Again, this is football.

Nobody’s life depends on watching a Thursday night game. But culture depends on shared experiences, and football remains one of the few left that still runs on a common clock.

Families watch together. Bars fill up. Towns pause. Military bases gather. That communal rhythm weakens when access turns into a subscription obstacle course.

When following your team starts to feel like managing a phone plan, something has gone wrong.

The Bottom Line

Fans should not have to:

  • Pay for internet
  • Pay for multiple subscriptions
  • And still sit through the same commercials

…to watch a sport that built its popularity on accessibility.

Modernize the delivery. Innovate the experience. Absolutely.

Just don’t confuse stacking paywalls with progress.

It’s football.
Not a space launch.
It doesn’t need to be this complicated.

At this rate, the next evolution of football will just be a free trial.

Chris

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