YouTube TV Cut the Price. It Also Cut the Channels

Few sports franchises make it as difficult to be a fan as the Denver Nuggets do. A years-long lawsuit with the local Regional Sports Network (RSN), Altitude Sports, left Comcast subscribers in Colorado without any way to watch regionally-televised games — for six years. What’s worse? The owner of the Denver Nuggets also owns Altitude Sports, actively locking out its own fans on the area’s most popular cable provider during the franchise’s first NBA Championship season.

Streaming wasn’t the boon you’d think. Depending on the day (and the season), I would be hunting games down on HBO Max, Prime Video, Peacock, or (when I’m most desperate) on the TVs in the bar at my local Cheesecake Factory.

Not only do you need multiple subscriptions to catch different sports, but you also need them to catch all the games in one sport. An Associated Press poll reported 40% of sports fans subscribe to multiple services.

The logical and ideal solution is a dedicated sports plan that covers all the essential matches for all your favorite teams. Unfortunately, YouTube TV’s new sports plan isn’t our white knight — it’s still largely missing regional coverage. But for just $65 per month ($18 cheaper than the main YouTube TV plan), the YouTube TV Sports Plan is one of the strongest options out there.

Channels

The new YouTube TV sports plan is built around three major ecosystems — ESPN/Disney, Fox Sports, and Warner Bros. Discovery — to optimize sports coverage across networks and coverage deals. Here’s the full channel lineup included in the plan:

Broadcast:

• ABC, FOX, NBC, CBS, CW, PBS, MyTV, StartTV, Cozy, Dabl, PBTV

Sports:

• ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNews, ESPNU
• FS1, FS2
• NBA TV, NFL Network, Golf Channel
• TBS, TNT, truTV, USA, NBC Sports, CBS Sports Network
• B1G Network, ACCN, SEC Network, TM2

Spanish-language:

• Telemundo, Univision, UniMás, TUDN

Features

YouTube TV has a few key features that you’re more likely to utilize on the sports plan — Multiview, Stats View, and Fantasy View unlock dynamic ways to watch a game. These features are also available with the main YouTube TV plan, but they're less useful outside of sports viewing

• Multiview — watch up to 4 games simultaneously
• Stats View — get live stats overlaid on your stream
• Key Plays — enjoy highlights without scrubbing
• Unlimited DVR — record everything, keep it indefinitely
• Up to 6 household accounts
• Fantasy View — see integrated fantasy data for the football season

The YouTube TV sports plan has surprisingly competitive college sports coverage for its budget-friendly price.

Between access to ACCN, B1G Network, and SEC Network, you’ll be able to catch a majority of collegiate competition. These channels cover college football, men’s and women’s basketball, hockey, soccer, volleyball, baseball, softball, gymnastics, and more. 

During March Madness, YouTube TV was one of the few traditional cable alternatives that offered every game of the men’s and women’s NCAA basketball tournaments. You’ll also be able to catch Army-Navy games, bowl games, and the Olympics.

The biggest gap for sports fans is regional coverage. This is traditionally the trickiest market to capture for streamers, with confusing blackouts and designated markets.

Traditionally, cable television packages were the easiest way to gain access to local RSNs, but even that is no guarantee — as Coloradans learned the hard way.

Some networks rely on RSNs for local coverage more than others. In New York, for example, three different RSNs have rights to local sports: YES Network (Yankees, Nets), SNY (Mets), and MSG Networks (Knicks, Rangers, Islanders).

Streamers are starting to break into the RSN game, with Fubo and DIRECTV Streaming leading the regional coverage range.

Every sport is different. MLB fans will miss the majority of regular-season games if they don’t have any RSN coverage. Subscribing to league-specific services like MLB.tv only solves the blackout issues if you buy local access add-ons.

Unfortunately, YouTube TV isn’t solving the regional sports conundrum.

In practice, that looks like this:

• No regional sports networks — full stop
• Local MLB games: likely blacked out
• Local NHL games: same problem
• Local NBA games for RSN-dependent teams: not here
• Everything else lives inside the ESPN, Fox Sports, and Warner ecosystem — for most fans, that's enough, but it's worth knowing before you commit

There’s little missing from the channel list for sports fans despite the budget-friendly price, but its value highly depends on the type of fan you are.

The broad-strokes sports fans who follow a wide variety of teams, sports, and leagues will enjoy YouTube TV’s bundled access to major network programming. Die-hard local sports fans may be better off subscribing to their local RSNs or a traditional cable package that includes them.

YouTube TV’s model is a slim one, catering to sports viewing without any extra entertainment slog, shopping networks, or movie channels — ideal for the focused viewer. Variety watchers who like a little bit of everything will probably prefer a different YouTube TV plan or traditional cable package.