The move proved to be prophetic, as Peacock executives saw almost immediately that the Premier League soccer game drove the most subscribers that first day—by far. Still, Cordella and the rest of Peacock’s management team remained somewhat skeptical about sports streaming; after all, they only had data from one game. But they scheduled at least one Premier League game a week for the rest of the season, and continued to see big numbers. That’s when, Cordella said, “a light bulb went off.” These days, Peacock now boasts a larger sports portfolio than any other general entertainment streaming service. In 2025-26, Peacock will carry more than 7,500 hours of live sports—more than Netflix, Amazon Prime, Paramount+, Hulu, Max, and Apple TV+ combined. The streamer has big-time rights including the NFL, Olympics, NBA, Big Ten, and Spanish-language World Cup. They also have rights to more niche sports with devoted fan bases, like the Tour de France and Six Nations rugby championship, many of which will be exclusive to the service. As my partner Julia Alexander noted this week, WBD C.E.O. David Zaslav learned the hard way that some sports strategies don’t work for all streamers. Zaz found that sports simulcasts, without meaningful stakes, failed to move the needle for his streaming service. Cordella, instead, has doubled down on major events, and leveraged Peacock as a value-add in NBC Sports’ deals with various leagues. Whether it was the Wild Card game, Olympics overtime coverage, WWE, or Big Ten football, Cordella saw that sports brought in new subscribers more quickly and efficiently than entertainment programming. Perhaps more importantly, those sports-minded subscribers largely stuck around. “There’s a general sense that sports fans are monolithic—that they represent only one demographic and only watch sports,” Cordella said. “That couldn’t be further from the truth.”

Peacock’s decision to carry Big Ten games would prove to be its most consequential sports move. Until then, Peacock’s sports strategy had largely focused on simulcasts and smaller sports; with the Big Ten deal, it was investing in exclusive games with premier teams. “The Big Ten moment was the first time we invested significant money in exclusive sports for Peacock,” Cordella said. “If you’re a big-time college basketball fan—men’s or women’s—Peacock’s probably a pretty big part of your diet.” As it turned out, those exclusive games yielded even higher levels of retention, and the viewers who subscribed just to watch a game tended to stick around and watch other content. “It’s like a door-buster sale,” Cordella said. “On Black Friday, people got in the door because you had this piece of content, but they stuck around and bought other things on the shopping list.” (As Julia recently pointed out, the LTV-CAC journey hasn’t been entirely seamless. While the service has grown to 41 million subscribers, it still lost $215 million in the first quarter this year.) The Peacock sports strategy will evolve even further this fall, when it picks up 50 exclusive NBA games, including playoff games. For Cordella, the NBA fills a hole in Peacock’s spring sports schedule. “One of the things that drew us to the NBA was the fact that it’s premium content in the spring, when there aren’t a lot of other sports happening. The fall landscape is dominated by college football and NFL. In the spring, we have events like the Derby, the U.S. Open, and Preakness, but those are one-day events. To have the NBA regular season and playoffs all the way through May will hopefully keep people engaged and keep those sub numbers up. When you run a streaming service, there’s always a hole in the bucket. You have to add more water to the top of the bucket to keep it filling up. The NBA, hopefully, is that water.” If Cordella sounds like he’s talking about linear strategy, it’s because Peacock really has become integrated into the NBCU programming strategy. And in this regard, it’s a novel bet that linear and streaming may have more in common than many originally considered.

On Amazon’s NASCAR ratings: “Imagine if a broadcaster highlighted demo viewership numbers after a major event the way Amazon has—reporters would immediately ask, ‘How bad was the viewership?’ It’s a double standard. Traditional broadcast networks are scrutinized if they don’t lead with total audience numbers, yet streamers are routinely given a pass, with media often defaulting to demos or vague metrics in their coverage.” —A media executive On the Summer of Soccer: “Between the FIFA Club World Cup and CONCACAF Gold Cup, it’s pretty clear that the soccer world is drawing way too much money out of the U.S. market. It feels like a bunch of racketeers. I can’t imagine that either MLS or U.S. soccer is really thrilled at how much the rest of the world is trying to extract as much money as possible from the U.S. market.” —A journalist On recommended pod topics: “I’d love to hear a discussion on the future streaming home for TNT Sports content once it separates from Max. Could there be one bidder seeking all of its streams—an ESPN or DAZN—or could it be looking into selling rights to separate streamers (Paramount for March Madness, ESPN for the CFP)?” —A Varsity subscriber On Dale Jr.’s podcast appearance: “What a treat that was to hear Dale Earnhardt Jr. I’m amazed at the growth of his emotional intelligence and his ability to speak plainly. His answer to your last question about what we should look for in the documentary brought a whole new dimension to the story: ‘He never should have made it.’ I’m probably within a very small group that listens to Dale/Dirty Mo Media pods and is a Puck Inner Circle sub.” —A happy Puck subscriber On Marchand: “I was so happy to see you skip your Marchand joke on Monday. Please stop. They’re not funny.” —A retired journalist More on Marchand: “Your Marchand joke on Tuesday was great. One of your best yet.” —A Varsity subscriber

Have a great weekend, John