SEATTLE—The National Football League said on Thursday it will stream a full season of live games over the Internet to gridiron fans outside of North America.
In partnership with Yahoo Inc., NFL Game Pass (www.nfl.com/nflgamepass) will allow fans from abroad to watch nearly every NFL game starting Sunday for $24.99 per week or $249.99 for the entire 17-week season.
The new service marks the league's first effort to deliver a full slate of live games online, following similar Web offerings from Major League Baseball and the National Basketball Association.
"We believe that the Internet has matured to a certain point that it really is an efficient distribution mechanism," said Brian Rolapp, the NFL's vice president of media strategy.
The NFL continues to seek ways to increase the game's popularity internationally, but Rolapp said the intention of Game Pass is to allow an existing fan base living around the world to follow their favorite local teams.
"This is not priced for mass consumer adoption. This is very targeted for an avid NFL fan," he said.
Yahoo has experience streaming video highlights from the 2006 World Cup for FIFA and National Hockey League playoff games to out-of-market fans in the United States.
Certain NFL games will be blacked out in certain markets under the League Pass if they overlap with a scheduled television broadcast of a game in that region.
Yahoo said the agreement with the NFL was exclusive, but would not disclose the financial terms of the deal.
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