With the launch of Fox Sports 1, hopefully one day Fox Sports will be able to rival ESPN, the World Wide Leader.
ESPN owns the sports media the way Google owns the search market. It’s great for those companies, bad for the consumer and even worse for competitors. These two imperial corporations are so world-dominating that they’re almost a brand synonymous with the product a la Kleenex, Rollerblade, or Xerox.
Hopefully, Fox Sports can change that as Fox Sports 1 takes off. Because with great power comes great responsibility, and ESPN has excessively abused that power. It’s been pretty obvious for quite some time that ESPN is more of a sports marketing company than it is a sports news company. No one embodies that as much as obvious shill Darren Rovell? Ralph Nader once called George W. Bush “a corporation disguised as a human being.” Darren Rovell personifies that quote in the sports media world.
We can’t have more creatures like Darren Rovell on the air. We must stop it now before our long national nightmare begins. Hopefully Fox Sports and Fox Sports 1 can.
From Investor’s Business Daily:
The new network will be formed from rebranded Fox’s Speed network, which broadcasts motor sports. It is already in more than 80 million households. The new network would focus on major sports from baseball to soccer and will have a show hosted by Regis Philbin, according to an article in the New York Times on Monday.
News Corp. isn’t new to sports broadcasting. It already has the rights to Pac-12 Conference and Big-12 Conference games and owns more than 20 regional sports networks. It also has the TV rights to World Cup soccer in 2018 and 2022.
But the channel won’t be trying to knock ESPN off the top sports spot.
“We’re not trying to beat ESPN,” Carey said at an investor conference. “That wouldn’t make sense to me.”
Fox executives did not comment on a second channel also being in the works — Fox Sports 2 — but, according to the Los Angeles Times, Goldman Sachs said News Corp. filed a trademark for the name.
Of course, The Mothership made moves of their own this week. ESPN announced a seven-year television deal that will run through the 2019 season. ESPN3 will provide coverage of LSU’s Pro Day on March 27.
Also, I’m not quite sure which empire is more evil- Disney/ABC/ESPN or Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp? As you can see from my signature below, I’m rather conflicted on this.
Paul M. Banks is CEO of The Sports Bank.net, a Google News site generating millions of visitors. He also contributes regularly to MSN, Fox Sports , Chicago Now, Walter Football.com and Yardbarker
A Fulbright scholar, author and MBA, Banks has appeared on the History Channel, as well as Clear Channel, ESPN and CBS radio all over the world. President Barack Obama follows him on Twitter (@Paul_M_BanksTSB)
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Filed under: ABC, ESPN, Fox, Traditional Media
Tags: espn competition, fox sports, fox sports 1, fox sports 2, fox sports competing with espn
