ESPN Reviews - The Worldwide Leader in Sports

ESPN has become one of the most watched sports channel by sports fans in U.S. history. ESPN which stands for Entertainment and Sports Programming has branded the slogan "The Worldwide Leader in Sports". ESPN has stuck that slogan by providing comprehensive sports coverage for over 25 years now 24 hours a day/7 days a week. Targeting mainly sports fans; ESPN is devoted to bringing all the latest sports news scores, and schedule. The popular sports such as basketball, football, and baseball gets more TV air time than others. However, ESPN offer sports fans a taste of variety by showcasing other sports such as golf, soccer, hockey, racing, tennis, bowling and even fishing! They also broadcast women sports such as the WNBA, college basketball and volleyball to broaden their audience to a diverse crowd and not just tailor to men.

The ultimate sports fan show on ESPN is SportsCenter. SportsCenter has been around since the inception of ESPN in 1979. Airing only once a day now airs at least 10 times a day recapping you with all the latest scores and highlights from major sporting events of your choice. The popularity of SportsCenter has been a key role in the success of ESPN. ESPN's success also comes from partnering up with different leagues to expand their fan base. National Basketball Association (NBA) was among the earliest to partner with ESPN for broadcasting, securing them with a $2.4 billion/six-year broadcast agreement. Another partner is the NFL (National Football League), which ESPN gained partial rights in 1987. They both agreed to broadcast games on local television stations in the participating markets, which continue today. Major League Baseball was later added in 1990 to ESPN's regular broadcast lineup. ESPN has broadcasted more sports than any other sports channel. As a result, some sport leagues have seen a significant increase in their fan base from the exposure.

Today ESPN's empire has grown substantially. ESPN has been able to expand its network to create ESPN2, ESPNEWS and ESPN Classics. ESPN own quite a few ESPN Zone restaurants around the U.S. as well. In addition, ESPN's recent success is when they merged with ABC in 2006 to broadcast all their sports programming and that's when ESPN took over broadcasting Monday Night Football. This was done to increase viewer ship of the Sunday night game and make Monday night the showcase game. According to David Carter, director of the Sports Business Institute at USC says, "With the increasing costs of live sports entertainment, scripted entertainment has become a luxury item for ESPN." Whether it's scripted or not, ESPN will always be a reliable sports channel to me and all the rest of the loyal sports fans out there.

sources I used: www.wikipedia.com