As the NFL gets ready to negotiate billions of dollars in new media contracts, which determine where fans will watch games and how much they'll pay to do so, a new entity has joined those talks: the federal government.
The Department of Justice has opened a probe into whether the NFL is harming consumers in the way it sells its broadcast rights.
A growing chorus of lawmakers and fans have expressed concern over the NFL and other leagues putting more games on subscription streaming services, leading to potentially increased costs for viewers. While the full scope of the probe is unclear, the NFL and other leagues have a limited antitrust exemption as part of the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961, which allows them to sell the broadcast rights to all games together to make them more widely available to fans.