How do blackouts work?

[BDBohnzie]

Blackout (broadcasting) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In the NFL, any broadcaster that has a signal that hits any area within a 75-mile (120 km) radius of an NFL stadium may only broadcast a game if that game is a road game, or if the game sells out 72 hours or more before the start time for the game.[5] If sold out in less than 72 hours, or is close to being sold out by the deadline, the team can sometimes request a time extension. Furthermore, broadcasters with NFL contracts are required to show their markets' road games. Sometimes if a game is very close to selling out, but not quite there, a broadcaster with rights to show the nearly sold out game will buy the remaining tickets (and give them to local charities) so it can broadcast the game (usually, this would involve no more than a few hundred tickets because of cost). Other teams elect to close off sections of their stadium, but cannot sell these tickets for any game that season if they choose to do so.[6] As a result, if the home team's game is a Sunday day game both networks can air only one game each in that market. (Until 2001, this rule applied whether or not the game was blacked out, however, this was changed because some markets virtually never aired doubleheaders as a result.) Usually, but not always, when each network can show only one game each in a market, the two stations work out between themselves which will show an early game and which will show a late game. This only affects the primary market, and not markets in a 75-mile (121 km) radius, which always get a doubleheader each Sunday.

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It's an archaic system set up back in the early years of television so the NFL owners didn't feel the pinch from fans who decided to watch the game on TV instead of in person. Those who suffer are the local fans who don't go to the stadium and have to settle the movie of the week.