Amazon’s First Foray Into Streaming Thursday Night Football Receives Mixed Review from Fans

Published: September 19, 2022

Amazon’s First Foray Into Streaming Thursday Night Football Receives Mixed Review from Fans

By Movieguide® Staff

Amazon’s first-ever exclusive “Thursday Night Football” stream on Amazon Prime received mixed reviews.

The Amazon Prime spot for the Thursday night game of NFL football marked a turning point for audiences watching sports, but it is still unclear whether it will take off.

The stream covered the game between the Los Angeles Chargers and the Kansas City Chiefs, a high-caliber matchup that would ensure some viewership.

Yahoo! Sports reported:

Amazon, which is paying $1 billion per year for the rights to stream the Thursday games, clearly spared no expense for its big move. It hired broadcasting legend Al Michaels to do play-by-play. It brought in ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit to do his first pro games. It created a studio show of notable NFL names like Richard Sherman.

The gargantuan company did whatever it could to make it feel like a real NFL broadcast, but that didn’t mean it was going to feel normal.

While some found the stream to present the highest resolution of live sports they had seen, others said it had some glaring technical issues. Moreover, the older generation had trouble finding the game in the first place.

Raise your hand if your dad has called because he “can’t get get the game to work.” 🙋‍♂️

— Kevin Seifert (@SeifertESPN) September 16, 2022

I honestly didn't know something could stream this clear. Quality on Amazon's broadcast is unreal. Looks better than cable.

— Nick Underhill (@nick_underhill) September 16, 2022

Enjoying the all-22 camera angles, player ID tags, and stats/info on the Amazon feed.

Nice features to have live during a game. pic.twitter.com/Wiz0N3zKfe

— Dane Brugler (@dpbrugler) September 16, 2022

One criticism I’ve heard of the @amazon #NFL broadcast tonight: the stadium acoustics feel weird. Not crisp. The sound of the stadium isn’t really coming through the way it does on NBC’s primetime games. Between snaps it feels dead. It makes the broadcast feel a little lethargic.

— Charles Robinson (@CharlesRobinson) September 16, 2022

While the 2022 NFL season opened to better ratings last year, it is unclear how the new streaming format for Thursday night games will affect the overall ratings for football this year.

Movieguide® previously reported:

After its debut week for the 2022 season, the NFL has already surpassed last year’s opening weekend TV ratings.

NBC’s Sunday Night Football and Monday Night Football telecasts led the way, helping total viewership for the first week of football to reach 18.5 million viewers across seven broadcast windows.

According to the NFL, 121 million people from the United States tuned in for at least a few minutes between Thursday and Monday.

For the league’s second week, broadcasters and the NFL will test out their first Thursday Night Football game exclusive to Amazon’s Prime Video.

While the NFL does not expect the streaming exclusives to reach the same numbers as broadcast TV games, NFL head of communications Jeff Miller said the model suits their long-term plans.

“It’s really a long-term strategic decision for the league,” Miller said. “We don’t have a number in mind, but our expectation is the ratings may very well not reach what Fox got [in 2021]. We believe this is the right thing to do in the long term, whether or not the number is what Fox got a year ago.”