Already reported to be caught off-guard by the recently announced joint streaming venture between Disney, Fox and Warner Bros. Discovery, NFL Chief Business Officer Brian Rolapp is publicly questioning the platform's value proposition ... before a price point has even been officially announced. 

"We were a little surprised by that -- the press has loved to talk about how surprised we were," Rolapp said Thursday, while speaking at the Washington Post's Futurist Summit in Washington D.C.

"I mean, we were a bit surprised. But I don't think it affects anything we do," Rolapp said. "They’re positioning it as the ultimate sports bundle, but it's missing more than half of NFL football, which we just got done saying is 93 of the top 100 telecasts. I don't understand how a sports fan is going to look at that and say, 'That's a better value than, say, for $20 more a month I could buy YouTube TV and have all of the NFL and then actually have access to Sunday Ticket, which is our out-of-market package on Sunday afternoons.

"So I'm a bit confused personally by the value proposition," Rolapp continued. "They clearly see something maybe that we don't at the time. But I do know our partners, which we do like, are leaning in and trying to figure out this new world, and you can't say that's not a bold step -- it certainly is -- that will probably have ramifications a bit to the pay TV world. But we'll have to see how it plays out."

Last week, the JV named former Apple and Hulu executive Pete Distad it's CEO, but the launch date, price and product name have still yet to be announced for a streaming service that will bundle the linear sports channels of its three owners. 

Business media has taken to informally monikering the platform as "Spulu" (as in "Sports Hulu"), while a general consensus has emerged suggesting the price will be around $50 a month. 

Addressing a number of topics beyond Spulu, Rolapp was also asked if the NFL is concerned about insolvency among any of its broadcast partners -- specifically, Paramount Global -- before it can reach the end of a $110 billion TV deal that ends in 2031. 

"No. We're not worried about any insolvency risk, and even if you look at Paramount and dive into it there is no risk, in our view, of them being a going concern," Rolapp said. "I think they're dealing with what every content distribution company in the world is dealing with, including the digital players, of how to adjust to a much different world where the world is increasingly digital first.

"So I think it doesn't matter if it's Disney or Paramount or Google, for that matter, all partners of ours," he added. "I think they're all figuring out how to shift their business model in this new world. They're just coming at it from two very different places.

Top TV execs are tightening up their chin straps as NFL rights negotiation season approaches. NFL games represent TV’s most powerful content, accounting for 22 of the 25 top-rated telecasts this year, and determine the winners and losers in the media world.

ESPN’s $1.9 billion a year deal for Monday Night Football expires after the 2021 season. The league’s deals with Fox, NBCUniversal, ViacomCBS and DirecTV, worth a total of $4 billion a year, expire after the 2022 season. Bet that the new deals will be more.

Wall Street knows how important the NFL is to networks and analysts pepper earnings calls with questions about discussions with the league. Last month, Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch called the NFL “our No. 1 programming partner” and tried to assure investors that “we look forward to continuing that partnership.”

Lining up for the NFL is Brian Rolapp, chief media and business officer for the league since 2017. The NFL’s  objective — beyond getting as much revenue as it can — remains  “maximizing the availability and reach of football and making sure that, locally, you can watch your team,” he said. 

But the decline in pay TV is creating a more fragmented landscape, making reaching humongous audiences more difficult. “That’s going to mean some changes in the future, which we’re trying to think through,” he said.

To see what the NFL is thinking, look at Thursday Night Football, a combination of broadcast with Fox, cable with the NFL Network and streaming with Amazon Prime Video. Rolapp said Thursday has been the NFL’s “strategic game package” and that its digital viewership is now bigger than the audiences other sports get on television.

Another experiment comes when playoff games go digital on CBS All Access and Peacock. Will that build reach? “We’ll find out,” Rolapp said. “We applaud their efforts to figure out how to innovate in this changing world, and we certainly want them to be successful.”

Rolapp doesn’t expect COVID to depress how much money the NFL will seek, or how much partners will be willing to pay. “We have not seen a lack of interest because of economic concerns,” he noted.

CBS Sports execs and a raft of talent from NFL broadcasts on Thursday night and Sunday converged at the network's midtown New York headquarters Tuesday (Aug. 25) for the annual NFL Media Day. Along with touting the upcoming second year of its Thursday collaboration with NFL Network, which starts Sept. 17, the network also highlighted Super Bowl 50, with the sales team asserting that the process is outpacing expectations.

While not apples-to-apples, comparisons between Thursday Night Football when it aired only on the NFL Network vs. 2014, when it added the primetime clout of CBS as well are pretty compelling. Average ratings spiked 52% for the season and boosted overall tune-in to the once distribution-challenged NFL Network.

Nevertheless, the reup with CBS covers just the eight games this fall. The single-season renewal reflects a degree of uncertainty about "what we want to do long term," said Brian Rolapp, executive VP of media for the NFL and head of the network. "There are a lot of changes in the media landscape. We've been very up-front with CBS and everyone else about that."

CBS Sports chief Sean McManus said the teaming with the NFL brought nothing but upside for the network. But looking more broadly at pro football, he pointed to the late game on Sunday afternoons.

"That is our bread and butter and has been for the last 14 years," McManus said. Ratings exceed the numbers of games in primetime on Thursday, Sunday and Monday, he noted.

Preparations are well under way for Super Bowl 50 next Feb. 7. A special trailer was shown to the assembled media. Its voiceover touted the fact that it will be the 19th Super Bowl for CBS, more than any other network. "The event no one wants to miss," the voiceover intoned. "The game no one will ever, ever forget."

CBS sales chief Jo Ann Ross and her sports lieutenants John Bogusz and Tony Taranto pronounced themselves "pleased" with inventory status for the big game, with Taranto noting that he began official talks with agencies the day after Super Bowl XLIX. They shied away from offering specific inventory numbers.

Among other minor announcements Tuesday, weekly wrap-up show Inside the NFL said Adam Schein would be coming aboard as a co-host, as part of the ongoing synergy between CBS and Showtime.

Read more at broadcastingcable.com.

For the NFL and CBS, it will be a whole new ballgame on Thursday night.

Following eight years of games on NFL Network, including five consecutive seasons of record viewership, the NFL wants to further grow its Thursday Night Football franchise. After increasing the schedule to 13 games during the 2012 and 2013 seasons, the league is bolstering the package to 16 (including a pair of Saturday affairs) with CBS stepping onto the field on one of TV’s most-watched nights and one favored by Madison Avenue and its studio, auto and retail clients. For a reported $275 million in rights fees, the nation’s most-viewed network will air games during the first half of the season that will be simulcast on NFL Network. The back-end of the schedule will feature games produced by CBS that will air on NFL and broadcast stations in the participating teams’ home markets.

“This is part of a long-term game plan, to gauge fans’ appetite for NFL football on Thursday night. We started NFL Network with an eight-game package, without great distribution in 2006,” said NFL Media executive vice president Brian Rolapp, noting that the league went to 13 games two seasons ago and NFL Network has 73 million subscribers. “Now we’re going to broadcast with the biggest network and simulcasts and we'll see how that does.”

CBS already views the move as a touchdown.

“The NFL is the most attractive property in television,” said CBS Sports chairman Sean McManus. “When the opportunity for Thursday Night Football presented itself, we went after it very aggressively. CBS is the No 1 network with a dominant position on Thursday. Thursday Night Football is going to make us stronger.”

And CBS is certainly putting its best cleats forward. The network’s No.1 team of Jim Nantz and Phil Simms will call the games on CBS, as well as on NFL Network, flanked by its top production crew.

“Thursday Night Football is the very highest priority for CBS Sports this year and one of the top for CBS Corporation,” said McManus. In addition to TNF, the teams will also work key doubleheader games on Sundays. “They have a somewhat grueling task” with 22 regular season games and up to 25 with playoffs. “I’d have some concerns, if Jim and Phil didn’t have such a great love for the game.”

McManus likened the TNF game plan to one sports have become familiar with over recent bouts of March Madness. “There are similarities with Turner and the NCAA tournament. There is lot of integration. The look, the graphics, the music will be the same. The talent is the same for both CBS and NFL Network, with the same crews behind and in front of the cameras, even when NFL Network takes over.” 

He underlined his point by saying viewers screen the “exact same product when they see a tournament game on CBS or TruTV.”

Rolapp said integration is key. “Talent and production are going to work together,” with NFL Network’s Rich Eisen, Steve Mariucci and Marshal Faulk working a 6:30 pregame show from outside stadium. From there, CBS’s James Brown and Bill Cowher will team with NFL Network’s Deion Sanders with the pregame show on CBS, kicking off at 7:30 from inside the venue. Rolapp said things will change over the course of the campaign with more NFL Network players getting into the game.

“We’ll see how to mix and match ideas and talent,” he said.

When it comes to the Nielsens, Rolapp said he doesn’t have a specific number in mind.

"We want to generate higher ratings and viewership,” he said, adding that’s it’s not only important that NFL Network games improve in the second half of the season, but its other programming as well, via cross-promotion and the additional exposure from CBS. “We want consumption to go up overall.”

For his part, McManus said he’s “not in the ratings prediction business,” before noting “they will be big and the best on Thursday night. How big will be determined by matchups and competitiveness of the games.”

Last season, NFL Network scored record numbers: a 5.0 rating, including contributions from the over-the-air stations of the participating teams, and 8 million viewers. Those deliveries were up 9% and 10%, respectively, from 2012. Led by the channel’s best-ever 7.0 and 11.1 million marks for the week three matchup between Andy Reid’s Kansas City Chiefs and his former team, the Philadelphia Eagles, NFL Network’s TNF telecasts were the most-watched programming on cable each of its 13 game nights. 

This year, the CBS/NFL Network combo is reportedly guaranteeing a 12.3 rating.

Although inventory remains in both the Thursday night and Sunday afternoon packages, McManus said CBS is ahead of ad sales projections for both.

Before the TNF opener between Baltimore  and Pittsburgh even kicks off on Sept. 11, McManus is already looking ahead.

"The NFL wants to make Thursday the same kind of destination that it has established on Monday and Sunday night,” he said, noting NFL holds a renewal option for the 2015 season. "We’re going to put our best product forward and would ike to be in a position to get involved further."

Rolapp wasn’t tipping his hand about the league's next TNF play or the future of NFL Network with primetime games.

“Like anything else, we will evaluate what happens and what we need to do better,” he said. “We always want to work with our partners in that fashion.”

CBS is also front and center with another significant scheduling change: "cross-flexing." As part of new nine-year contracts with Sunday broadcast partners, Black Rock on occasion will air national NFC matchups that previously would have run on Fox before a smaller regional audience. Similarly, Fox will televise AFC matchups, formerly the province of CBS.

"We’ve been talking to the NFL about this for years,” said McManus. “There are lots of good matchups in NFC East and West, and more exposure is in everyone’s best interest. It’s another tool in NFL’s arsenal to improve the schedule. I think it will increase ratings for both CBS and FOX, and be better for fans."

Rolapp shares that viewpoint.

"Cross-flexing is part of contract for next nine years and we think it will help generate more exposure for the NFL overall, Four games are set, and we have the ability to do two or three others," he said. "We’ll see how it goes."

Asked if the new schedule mechanism coulld hinder Fox and its bigger market NFC deal, Rolapp replied' 'I don’t think it’s detrimental to Fox. This is more exposure for games that otherwise would not have this kind of reach. This is not going to hurt, but enhance the package and generate extra viewers.”

The Washington/San Francisco on Nov 23 and Chicago Detroit on Thanksgiving are among the contests being cross-flexed to CBS.

The new contracts will also afford more flex scheduling possibilities on NBC. As was the case under expiring pact, the Peacock will still air better matchups from week 11 through 17 from the NFL’s original schedule. Now, two more games can be upgraded between weeks five and 10.

“It’s an insurance policy,” said Rolapp, explaining that the plan's roots goes back to the 2011 season when Peyton Manning was injured. What before the season appeared on paper to be a great matchup between the New Orleans Saints and Manning’s former team, the Indianapolis Colts, didn’t turn out that way. “We were locked into a non-competitive game,” said Rolapp of the Saints' 62-7 demolition in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome in Manning’s native New Orleans, as the quarterback sat out entire season with neck injuries requiring surgeries.

Rolapp said the idea is to “maximize viewership, and to increase overall fan consumption for the league.”

For NFL Media executive vice president Brian Rolapp, pro football’s game plan is centered around consumption.

As in, “we want consumption to go up overall,” with ratings and all other metrics.

That certainly has been the case with the Nielsens. Last season, all of the league’s network partners tackled improved and or record, or near record-numbers.

ESPN's 17-game Monday Night Football slate averaged 13.68 million viewers during the 2013 season, up 7% from 2012 and the third-best since ESPN began airing the franchise in 2006.

CBS’s regular-season schedule averaged 18.7 million viewers, a 6% increase over 2012’s 17.7 million average, and its second-highest average viewership in 26 years with the AFC television package.

For Fox, 2013 marked its regular season since it started broadcasting NFL games back in 1994, scoring 21.2 million viewers on average, an 8% increase over the 19.7 million in 2012 and 5% above 2010, which had stood its most-watched ever with 20.1 million

NBC averaged 21.7 million watchers with Sunday Night Football and its 19 regular-season telecasts, up slightly from 21.4 million in 2012. Last year, was the Peacock’s second best behind the 21.8 million average in 2010 over its eight seasons with the window.  Overall, SNF stood as primetime’s top show for a third consecutive year, and it ranked first among women 18 to 49, marking the first time an NFL primetime package won the fall season with that group.

Now, the league is looking to drive to new heights on Thursday nights with CBS and NFL Network, which counts some 73 million subscribers, teaming on broadcasts.

But Rolapp says consumption of the league’s games and other content continues to build elsewhere.

NFL Red Zone, the Sunday-afternoon ad hoc scoring and highlights service, is still in a growth mode, having adding 20 new providers since January and will enter the 2014 campaign with 250 affiliates. “We’re very happy with NFL Red Zone from distribution and production standpoints,” he said, noting that distributors are proffering the product either as part of sports tiers or an a la carte basis.

Although he didn’t disclose any sign-up totals, Rolapp said early returns for personalized video service, NFL Now, have been “positive.”

Accessible across Internet-connected devices, NFL Now enables users to identify their favorite team, fantasy players and video content preferences. The service enables users to dynamically personalize their viewing experiences by delivering customizable news, analysis and highlights. Additionally, NFL Now will provide users with access to a vault of on-demand NFL video content available anywhere.

Rolapp said NFL Media has not been concentrating on working with ISPs on marketing pacts to promote the service, but instead “the focus has been on getting the product where it needs to be. There have been some kinks we’re working through but we’re excited about what users will see as we move toward the start of the season.”

NFL Now Plus ups the ante – for $1.99 per month, subscribers can check out instant in-game highlights, plus gain access to all NFL Films’ compete library, including NFL Network staples America’s Game and A Football Life.

He also noted the service has attracted interest from advertisers, as McDonald’s and Nationwide have joined Verizon and Gillette, which were designated as launch sponsors when NFL commissioner Roger Goodell introduced the products during Super Bowl Week in New York.

“We’re being judicious with sponsors,” he said. “Clearly, demand outstrips inventory.”

Rolapp also pointed to enhanced streaming capabilities for the league’s official wireless service provider. As part of a reported four-year $1 billion renewal, Verizon’s NFL Mobile package will broaden this season, with subscribers gaining access to more streaming content. Not only will telco’s customers continue to be able to stream the NFL’s primetime fare on Sunday, Monday and Thursday night, as well NFL Network and NFL Red Zone, but beginning with the 2014 season, NFL Mobile from Verizon will expand to include access to live CBS and Fox Sunday afternoon games within their home markets, as well as all postseason matchups, including the Super Bowl.