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Phil Mickelson hugged Tiger Woods after winning Friday's game in Las Vegas.(Photo: The associated press)
Comcast is one of the major carriers that has committed to paying back customers who paid $ 20 to watch "The Match", an à la carte golf event that was shattered on Friday.
A problem related to the B / R Live interface – the Turner Sports property that produced the $ 9 million golf event – began before the departure of Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods. As a result, "The Match" was made available to anyone who could follow the event won by Mickelson on 22 holes.
"Comcast will proactively issue a $ 19.99 credit to any Xfinity TV customer who has purchased the pay-per-view event" The Match ", the statement said. "We hope that Turner and Bleacher Report will do the same, since the event was made available for free on The Bleacher Report website."
On Saturday, Charter Spectrum and Cox Communications announced in a statement to USA TODAY Sports that they would do the same. AT & T, which operates DirecTV, has not responded to several messages requiring comment.
"We are giving proactive credit to everyone who has paid The Match through Cox," Cox Communications said in a statement. "Since Turner has broadcast the event for free to a wider audience at the last minute due to technical issues, we are happy to be able to arrange the event properly for those who have already paid."
B / R Live, in a statement to USA TODAY Sports, said that "technical problems" were affecting access.
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The statement was as follows: "We encountered technical issues on B / R Live that temporarily affected users' access to" The Match ". We have taken a number of steps to solve the problem, our main priority being the provision of content to those who have purchased the pay-per-view event. "
Turner Sports, the parent company of B / R Live, has not said whether it plans to reimburse those who have purchased "The Match" through applications via B / R Live on various streaming platforms such as Apple TV, Google Chromecast and Roku, and the B / R Live website.
Nicholas Masafumi Watanabe, professor of sports and entertainment management at the University of South Carolina, told USA TODAY Sports that The Match would have needed about 700,000 purchases to break even. This number probably took a hit due to technical problems.
"I think these media companies need to be aware that organizing pay-per-view events carries a risk," said Watanabe. "If the investment in infrastructure and bandwidth needed to broadcast these events is not enough, consumers may be less likely to buy pay-per-view."
Turner Sports is a new entry in the a la carte game, although other major players in the segment have had similar problems.
UFC and its distribution partner that it has since bought, NeuLion, have been seized of a class action lawsuit. Fans who bought the $ 100 Floyd Mayweather Jr. match against Conor McGregor were unable to keep up with the fight. This lawsuit was settled earlier this year and fully reimbursed those who registered to join the class action.
DAZN, a streaming service run by former ESPN president John Skipper, was struggling to broadcast NFL games in Canada and professional football in Japan, said Watanabe. It was launched in the United States earlier this year with the firm intention of challenging Showtime PPV and HBO PPV boxing, and has secured many international streaming rights.
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