ESPN To Show More Olympics Coverage Than Other News Outlets
By John Ourand, Staff Writer
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ESPN's "SportsCenter" To Be Allowed
To Show Six Minutes Of Olympic Footage |
Oswald the Lucky Rabbit is going to help ESPN cover the Olympics from Beijing next month. Thanks to the deal it brokered in '06 that effectively traded Al Michaels for the rights to the cartoon figure and other programming, ESPN will be allowed more Olympics coverage than other media outlets. ESPN will be allowed to show six minutes of Olympics footage in each of its news shows from "SportsCenter" to "First Take." It also has rights to use footage for up to 48 hours after NBC's prime-time window ends. All other networks will be allowed to show six minutes of Olympics footage per day and have the rights to use footage for up to 24 hours after NBC's prime-time window ends. One aspect of the Oswald/Michaels deal, which saw ESPN pay NBC $12M for a bucket of Ryder Cup and Olympics rights, was to give ESPN added Olympics highlight rights through 2012. ESPN plans to devote a significant part of its "SportsCenter" newscasts to the Games, especially since it will be debuting its new live morning "SportsCenter" editions August 11, three days after the Olympics begin. But one of the show's top executives warned that NFL training camp may take precedence. "NFL coverage is a priority for us," said Mark Gross, ESPN's Senior VP & Managing Editor of Studio Production. "That's what our fans want. They're looking for NFL coverage year-round."
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Schaap To Be Part Of ESPN's
Staff On Ground In Beijing |
COVERAGE PLANS: ESPN plans to staff a small office in China with two reporters (Jeremy Schaap and George Smith), three producers (Arty Berko, Justine Gubar and Greg Amante) and three cameramen (Jeff Spencer, Bill Roach and Rick Mickler). The amount of time "SportsCenter" devotes to the Olympics will be completely dependent on the story lines that come out of China, Gross said. During the recent U.S. swimming trials, Michael Phelps and Dara Torres' results each made the first block of "SportsCenter." The problem is that ESPN's news personnel are not certain of what to expect in China, in terms of what they are allowed to cover outside of the venues, making this more challenging to plan for than the Summer Games in Atlanta or Sydney. In addition to covering press conferences and conducting athlete interviews, ESPN will have evergreen reports in the can, including "Outside the Lines" reports on Kenyan marathoners (scheduled for August 17), a report on Tibet activism by NBA players, and a look at China's pollution problem. ESPN plans to try to venture away from the venues for reports. "We're going to work closely with ABC News to see what stories they are working on," Gross said. "We have a plan in place, but the plan can easily be adjusted to react to news."
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