YouTube TV Might Have More Leverage Against ESPN/Disney Than Expected

Google's YouTube TV might have more leverage against Disney in its ongoing carriage standoff than many initially thought.

In theory, YouTube TV is easier to replicate than Disney’s networks like ESPN and ABC. As ESPN continues to remind fans through its top on-air personalities, viewers can readily turn to competing services like Hulu + Live TV, Fubo, and DirecTV to view all the NFL and college football games currently unavailable on YouTube TV.

Yet early data suggests subscribers aren’t as quick to switch providers as Disney may have expected. Case in point: Monday Night Football.

This past Monday, the Cardinals–Cowboys matchup drew just 16.2 million viewers across ESPN, ABC, ESPN2, ESPN Deportes, and NFL+. That’s a 21.4% drop from Week 9 last season. And that's despite this year’s game benefiting from Nielsen’s new Big Data + Panel methodology, which has resulted in increased averages for live sporting events.

Cardinals–Cowboys also fell noticeably short of Commanders–Chiefs’ 17.6 million viewers a week earlier and Lions–Bucs’ 18.8 million two weeks prior. And those two games faced stiff competition from the MLB postseason. The Lions–Bucs competed head-to-head with Game 7 of the ALDS, while Commanders–Chiefs aired at the same time as the 18-inning classic that was Game 3 of the 2025 World Series.

This week, there was no playoff baseball siphoning off NFL viewers.

The declines this past Monday are almost certainly the result of the YouTube TV blackout. Seeing a Cowboys game drop double digits year-over-year this early in the season is almost unheard of.

Could viewers grow more desperate if they miss a second straight weekend of pro and college football? Perhaps. But as Front Office Sports reporter Ryan Glasspiegel noted on X, subscribers may be more reluctant to ditch YouTube TV this time around because they’ve already experienced the headaches of rival platforms during past disputes.

"My understanding is YTTV has better UX than all the other streaming bundles, so most people who sample Hulu or Fubo or Sling or whatever will come back once the dust settles," Glasspiegel wrote.

"Yup. Already been down that road. None of the other services come close," added popular Packers podcaster Aaron Nagler.

In short, YouTube TV benefits from what we might call default-ism. Like users of Google, Netflix, Gmail, YouTube, and Roku – YouTube TV's subscribers have grown so accustomed to the service that they find competitors’ layouts clunky and confusing.

Consider Google Chrome. Despite its many issues, users keep using it because learning to operate another browser is a hassle. It's time-consuming — especially for Boomer demographics. That’s default-ism in action.

Meanwhile, Disney reportedly loses about $5 million per day while its channels remain off YouTube TV, according to Awful Announcing. At some point, those losses become hard to ignore, even for a company with a $198.6 billion market cap.

Thus, until or unless YouTube TV subscribers cancel en masse, the financial strain of this standoff falls disproportionately on Disney.

Of course, sports fans are the biggest losers in the YouTube TV–Disney dispute. But for now, Disney is the second biggest.

Advantage: Google.

Realted: Google/YouTube TV And Disney/ESPN Battle While SEC Fans Are the Big Losers | Clay Travis