It took about 24 hours for one of our “unanswered questions” from the NFL’s Sunday Ticket deal with Google to be answered.
On Friday, Front Office Sports reported that the DirecTV’s Red Zone Channel, hosted by Andrew Siciliano, will be axed after this season. FOS initially reported on Thursday that DirecTV’s version could face the axe with Google taking Sunday Ticket over on YouTube for the 2023 season and beyond.
“On RedZone, we’re going to focus on the Red Zone produced by NFL Media,” said Dhruv Prasad, the NFL senior vice president, media strategy & strategic investments, on Thursday and, confirming a Front Office Sports report on the move. “And that’s what will be available on YouTube.”
The NFL Media version of RedZone is the one hosted by Scott Hanson, available everywhere but DirecTV. It premiered several years after the Siciliano-hosted version debuted.
Going with one version of RedZone is the logical move. It remains to be seen whether Hanson will remain as host, or if Siciliano or someone else will take over, or even if they’ll have two hosts tag team it each week. However, Hanson did receive a multi-year extension from the NFL in 2021 to continue as the host of RedZone.
The debate about the superior RedZone host and overall format and presentation of each channel has raged on for years (we compared both back in 2018). Come the 2023 season, viewers will all be getting the same experience, for better or worse.