Twitter Wins Bid To Stream Thursday Night NFL Games In 2016

The NFL took a step toward the future when Yahoo! live-streamed the Buffalo Bills–Jacksonville Jaguars game in London last season, and the success of it ensured that we would see similar things going forward. On Tuesday morning, commissioner Roger Goodell announced that Twitter will live-stream 10 Thursday Night Football games during the 2016 season.

This fall Thursday Night Football will be streamed live @twitter so fans will see more of this. https://t.co/s6tbr9FjvY

— Roger Goodell (@nflcommish) April 5, 2016

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey offered his thought via a statement.

“This is about transforming the fan experience with football. People watch NFL games with Twitter today,” Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said in a statement. “Now they’ll be able to watch right on Twitter Thursday nights.”

Twitter’s partnership for Thursday night broadcasts will include in-game highlights and pre-game broadcasts with players and teams on Periscope.

For the NFL, providing another avenue for fans to view games in real time makes great business sense. Thursday night games during next season feel like the first step in a process that will end with live streaming on social media for every game each week, be it Twitter now and over the next few years or another platform further into the future. It’s unclear if there will be big tangible benefits on the other side of the partnership, but Goodell’s interest is to make NFL owners money and partnering with Twitter should accomplish that.