Who isn’t a displaced fan these days? So many people grow up in one place and move to another, especially with the economy the way it’s been the last decade or so. That’s why I believe that you’ll see a lot more single-team packages throughout the pay-TV and streaming world, and here’s one of the first. I’ll let the press hacks over at DISH tell you about it:
ENGLEWOOD, Colo.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Today, DISH became the first pay-TV provider to offer NBA TEAM PASS. The new single team offering, available for $119, will allow DISH customers to follow any one of the NBA’s 30 teams throughout the regular season with live access to every out-of-market game.
DISH will continue to offer NBA LEAGUE PASS, the sport’s full season package, for $199 with up to 40 live out-of-market games from around the league every week and on demand coverage. “As the NBA laces up for a new season, DISH is giving customers the choice of following the entire league or picking their favorite team,” said Josh Clark, vice president of Programming for DISH. “Now an NBA fan on the East Coast who wants to follow just their favorite West Coast team can opt for NBA TEAM PASS.”
The hitch at the moment is this is really a displaced fan package. The NBA still has blackout rules that mean that your local team’s games may not be available, period. If you’re lucky they’ll be available from a local TV station, but this isn’t the case for much of the country. So the real value for this package is for Pistons fans who live in Heat territory, or for Lakers fans who find themselves stuck in the land of the Celtics.
Still, it’s a start. As I said, I believe you’ll start seeing these single-team packages throughout all the pay-TV and streaming packages. Basketball is just as good a place as any to start, and with the basketball season seeming to stretch year round, it’s a pretty good value. At the moment, the single-team price is fairly close to the whole package price, but I do expect to see a bigger difference between single-team and whole-package pricing in the coming years; it’s only common sense.
