NHL Fans Outraged at Gary Bettman as Soaring Streaming Prices Make Watching Games Tougher Than Ever
Blackhawks fans are in a bind if they want to watch their team without access to cable television and now they are growing increasingly frustrated as Gary Bettman partners with streaming services at outrageous prices.
As we continue to enter a world dominated by streaming services, many cable television networks are starting to suffer in a big way. For example, Diamond Sports Group, which previously covered many NHL teams, is currently going through bankruptcy. Other networks are not far from the same fate, leading to panic in the entire sports world, not just the NHL. However, we are starting to see some solutions. For example, the Dallas Stars launched Victory Plus this season, a free service allowing fans in Texas to stream all Stars games.
Unfortunately, Blackhawks fans are not so lucky. For them, they do not have any good options to stream Hawks games. ESPN+ covers most of their games, but still have blackout restrictions in place for local fans so that is not an option. As such, fans without Cable are forced to turn to FuboTV, which does offer all the coverage of the team they want, but at an exorbitant cost. Currently, a subscrition costs a whooping 80 US Dollars a month, which is around the same price as cable if not more anyways. Chicago Sports Network President Jason Coyle tried to emphasize the positives of the deal, but at that price most fans are simply going to walk away or worse, pirate the games.
Furthermore, the NHL has a growing problem with TV ratings just two years into their deals with ESPN and TNT. The NHL has since been expanding their coverage into new platforms including Prime Video, but that often leads to more disappointment and frustration for fans who do not have every single streaming platform out there. Still though, it seems as though Gary Bettman intends to continue moving the league's coverage away from cable TV. Hopefully, all of this results in a world where the NHL is more accessible and affordable to all fans. So far we have seen mixed results on this front, but with any luck your favorite team will be available to stream for free in the near future.
