The cusp of the NFL season is upon us, and with that comes the return of everyone's favorite Sunday football programming, NFL RedZone with beloved host Scott Hanson. "7 hours of commercial-free football!" was always a welcoming phrase for fans after a seven-month hiatus from the show. At least it was until RedZone host Hanson went onto ESPN's Pat McAfee Show on Tuesday afternoon and announced to the football world that from this point on, it is now "7 hours of RedZone football".
That's right folks, full commercial breaks are now coming to NFL RedZone. For many fans, no commercial breaks was the main selling point for many, but now they are having to pay the same price for the same product without the biggest benefit. In a sports broadcasting world now riddled with more ads and less coverage of actual games, the seemingly last beacon of football broadcasting with limited commercial breaks is changing. The move comes less than a month after sports entertainment juggernaut ESPN bought all the rights to the NFL-owned NFL Network, and, along with that, the rights to NFL RedZone.
Not to mention the news was just now being told to fans, with only four days before the first RedZone broadcast of the season. You can say that it's incredibly indicative of how ESPN runs its programs that, as Scott Hanson was breaking the news, McAfee and crew joked with an ad being plastered on the screen at the same time.
Soon after the news broke, many fans went to social media to express their displeasure with the move. Hanson has said that he does not deal with the business side of the show, and only being the host, he has no control over certain elements of what may or may not be shown on the show. Hanson also stated that the commercials won't interfere with the usual broadcast and fans won't miss any action they formerly would've seen.
But that's missing the entire point of what made ReZone so great.
The sports world is slowly showing less and less coverage of games and more and more commercials, while at the same time making it harder for fans to watch every game. With so many games airing at the same time, RedZone and Hanson were the best at controlling the chaos and getting all the scores and big plays to fans that they would otherwise miss.
ESPN has slowly been making it apparent that they are moving away from the real coverage and recaps of games and moving to a focus on talk shows and discussion-based coverage. Games no longer start on time, ads are shoved in fans' faces anytime they find a chance during a game, and all at the same time, talk show hosts seem more interested in going for clicks on social media than providing actual insight on certain games and sports. The once highly touted SportsCenter that many sports fans loved now seems like a shadow of what the network is becoming.
As a fan who recently found out about how great RedZone is (or was), I still find it hard to believe that the NFL and other leagues are putting fans first. At this point, fans have no other choice but to succumb to the onslaught of commercials and ads if they want to watch their favorite sports/teams. The sports broadcast world is changing, and whether we as fans like it or not, it's apparent that networks are moving on from us and selling out to the highest bidder.
Just for the upcoming season, NFL fans need five different streaming apps and services just to be able to watch games they used to be able to turn on and watch with a basic cable package. With games this year being on Peacock, Amazon Prime, Netflix, Paramount+, and the newly created ESPN Unlimited app, fans are having to download more apps, while at the same time having to shell out more money to watch games. The networks profit while the fans are left as an afterthought.
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