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By Michael Hiestand, USA TODAY
Finally, fans will get live NFL TV action in the clouds.
DirecTV, a satellite TV provider, will announce Wednesday the most imaginative tactic in the hubbub over how viewers might get NFL games that air on the NFL Network. DirecTV will show them on the giant video screen on its blimp as it flies above towns whose cable operators don't carry the league's channel.
Don't laugh. TV sports on a blimp probably will be as good as other platforms for TV sports — such as the tiny screens on cellphones — that have emerged through the miracle of technology. The appeal of DirecTV's idea could blossom, eventually, if viewers would be able to shadow its blimp on giant inflatable couches.
But for now the blimp is just trying to exploit the hubbub over most U.S. households not having access to the NFL Network's games. DirecTV, which carries the network, is trying to tout the appeal of its games — including the New England Patriots potentially going for a perfect season against the New York Giants in the regular-season finale — to try to win over cable TV subscribers who can't get the channel from their cable operators. (Only about one-third of U.S. households get the NFL Network.)
So, for the network's prime-time Denver Broncos-Houston Texans game Thursday and Cincinnati Bengals-San Francisco 49ers game Saturday, the DirecTV blimp will air the games — its first live video — on its 70x30-foot screen, which is billed as "the largest aerial digital screen."
The blimp, which can fly as low as 1,000 feet, will sail over the Tampa-St. Petersburg area showing those games and next week will show NFL Network games while floating above Orlando. Those locales, DirecTV senior vice president Jon Gieselman says, were picked partly because the blimp was slated to be in Florida anyway — and also because cable operators in those areas don't carry the NFL Network.
The blimp won't offer game audio because it doesn't have any speakers to blast out sounds. And fans in the Northeast who don't get the NFL Network and will miss the Patriots-Giants game shouldn't expect to look to the sky for help. Says Gieselman, "This time of year with blimps, you want to stay south."
NFL TV, P.S. Plenty of ideas have popped up about what the NFL Network might do to let more households get the Dec. 29 Patriots-Giants game, such as offering it free to all cable operators or giving it to NBC in exchange for its final regular-season game.
But network spokesman Seth Palansky says there's "zero chance" of anything happening. He also paraphrases lyrics from singer Carrie Underwood, saying there's as much chance of anything being changed as there is of "raindrops going back into clouds."
Finally, fans will get live NFL TV action in the clouds.
DirecTV, a satellite TV provider, will announce Wednesday the most imaginative tactic in the hubbub over how viewers might get NFL games that air on the NFL Network. DirecTV will show them on the giant video screen on its blimp as it flies above towns whose cable operators don't carry the league's channel.
Don't laugh. TV sports on a blimp probably will be as good as other platforms for TV sports — such as the tiny screens on cellphones — that have emerged through the miracle of technology. The appeal of DirecTV's idea could blossom, eventually, if viewers would be able to shadow its blimp on giant inflatable couches.
But for now the blimp is just trying to exploit the hubbub over most U.S. households not having access to the NFL Network's games. DirecTV, which carries the network, is trying to tout the appeal of its games — including the New England Patriots potentially going for a perfect season against the New York Giants in the regular-season finale — to try to win over cable TV subscribers who can't get the channel from their cable operators. (Only about one-third of U.S. households get the NFL Network.)
So, for the network's prime-time Denver Broncos-Houston Texans game Thursday and Cincinnati Bengals-San Francisco 49ers game Saturday, the DirecTV blimp will air the games — its first live video — on its 70x30-foot screen, which is billed as "the largest aerial digital screen."
The blimp, which can fly as low as 1,000 feet, will sail over the Tampa-St. Petersburg area showing those games and next week will show NFL Network games while floating above Orlando. Those locales, DirecTV senior vice president Jon Gieselman says, were picked partly because the blimp was slated to be in Florida anyway — and also because cable operators in those areas don't carry the NFL Network.
The blimp won't offer game audio because it doesn't have any speakers to blast out sounds. And fans in the Northeast who don't get the NFL Network and will miss the Patriots-Giants game shouldn't expect to look to the sky for help. Says Gieselman, "This time of year with blimps, you want to stay south."
NFL TV, P.S. Plenty of ideas have popped up about what the NFL Network might do to let more households get the Dec. 29 Patriots-Giants game, such as offering it free to all cable operators or giving it to NBC in exchange for its final regular-season game.
But network spokesman Seth Palansky says there's "zero chance" of anything happening. He also paraphrases lyrics from singer Carrie Underwood, saying there's as much chance of anything being changed as there is of "raindrops going back into clouds."
