A lobby born from a regulatory review
On September 14, 2026, Amazon, Netflix and YouTube launched the Streaming Access and Choice Alliance (SACA), a coalition run by the trade group TechNet. The Next Web reports that SACA will press for "technology-neutral policies" that let streaming services invest in all kinds of programming, live sports included. TechNet's Mike Ward framed the goal as giving Americans more choice in how and where they watch.
The timing is not subtle. The Justice Department and the FCC are examining whether the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961 should be revisited. FCC Chair Brendan Carr has questioned whether the antitrust exemption is pushing too many games behind paywalls.
The strongest case for reform
The critics deserve a fair hearing. The Act, codified at 15 U.S.C. § 1291, takes joint league agreements to sell the rights "in the sponsored telecasting of the games" outside the Sherman Act and the FTC Act. Congress wrote that language in 1961, when "telecasting" meant free over-the-air broadcast. Carr's argument is that the exemption was a bargain: leagues get to pool rights, and the public gets games on free TV. If leagues use that pooled power to sell exclusives to paid services, the bargain has changed without Congress ever voting on it.
The consumer-cost evidence gives that argument weight. As WJLA reported, Sen. Mike Lee said fans spent nearly $1,000 last season on cable and streaming subscriptions to see every NFL game. The league's media rights are spread across Disney, Paramount, Fox, NBCUniversal, Amazon, Google, Netflix and others, and collectively will exceed $100 billion.
What the FCC has actually opened
The FCC's Media Bureau issued a Public Notice in late February 2026 seeking comment on sports broadcasting practices and marketplace developments (DA 26-188). Covington's summary says initial comments were due March 27 and replies April 13. The notice asks about rights allocation across platforms, including exclusive, simulcast and replay rights. It also asks how subscription streaming affects consumer costs and access, and whether current arrangements hinder broadcasters' public-interest obligations.
Two features of this record matter. First, it is a request for comment, not a rule. Second, the FCC has no direct authority over leagues or streaming services. The Sherman Act exemption is enforced by DOJ and the courts, and it can only be changed by Congress. A Media Bureau notice can shape the debate, but it cannot rewrite a statute.
Why technology neutrality is the better principle
SACA's pitch has a self-interested origin, since three of the world's largest companies are bidding for rights. That does not make it wrong. The principle holds up on its merits.
- The distribution medium is not the harm. Antitrust law asks whether pooled rights foreclose competition or raise prices unreasonably, not whether a game travels over spectrum or broadband. University of Miami antitrust expert Michael Kelly told WJLA that fan frustration is understandable but the practice does not violate antitrust law, because "a seller has a right to choose his channels of distribution."
- Streaming bidders expand the rights market. Amazon, Netflix and YouTube add buyers alongside the incumbent broadcasters. More bidders generally raise what leagues earn, and they can fund new formats and international reach. Regulation that favours one medium lets legacy broadcasters keep a protected position.
- Free access is not disappearing. The NFL says 87% of its games remain on local broadcast television, a league claim that regulators should test but that frames the scale of the problem. A handful of marquee exclusives is not the same as a general migration behind paywalls.
Broadcasters have their own agenda here too. The National Association of Broadcasters, Fox and Sinclair each urged the FCC to reexamine the Act, according to trade press, while also pressing for relaxed ownership caps. That is worth bearing in mind when the proceeding is cast as a consumer-protection exercise.
A proportionate path
The record points toward targeted, evidence-driven fixes rather than repeal or reinterpretation by threat.
- Measure before legislating. The inquiry should publish what share of games, and which games, sit behind subscriptions, and what a fan actually pays to follow one team. Today the key numbers come from a senator's estimate and a league's talking point.
- Keep the exemption's scope clear. If Congress wants a free-to-air floor for a set of marquee events, it should say so in statute, as other countries do with listed-events regimes, rather than relying on regulators to suggest that the existing text implies one.
- Reject medium-based rules. Obligations that apply only to streaming services would penalise the new entrants and shield the incumbents. Whatever access conditions apply should apply to every distributor.
- Avoid regulatory leverage over leagues' business choices. Warnings that exclusives could void legal protections create uncertainty without a legal finding behind them. If DOJ believes there is a Sherman Act problem, it should bring it and let a court decide.
The consumer complaint is genuine, and a statute from 1961 plainly did not contemplate Netflix. But the fix for a fragmented, expensive market is more competition for rights and transparent data, not a rule that decides in advance which technology may carry the game. On that narrow point, SACA's technology-neutral position is the one regulators should adopt, regardless of who is lobbying for it.