The NHL, WNBA, and ESPN have all announced new content initiatives to keep their audiences engaged while live sports are on hiatus due to the coronavirus pandemic.
On Monday, the NHL launched a social media campaign asking fans to vote for the best moments of the 2019-20 NHL season, which was suspended indefinitely on March 12. The “tournament” will be a six-round, bracket-style format, with fans placing their votes via the league’s Twitter account and Instagram Stories feature. The bracket will start with 64 video moments and head-to-head matchups unveiled daily at noon, allowing fans to vote until the end of the day before starting the next round.
The NHL has also begun hosting live player Q&A sessions every weekday at 3 p.m. ET on the league’s Twitter and Instagram channels. Players will answer questions submitted from fans. Boston Bruins forward David Pastrnak was the first player to participate on Monday. Both the Q&A sessions and fan-voted greatest moment programs are part of NHL Pause Binge, a digital content portal established by the league due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The WNBA is offering a 30-day free preview of WNBA League Pass, which normally costs $16.99 per season. The preview allows fans to stream every game on-demand from the 2019 season. The upcoming WNBA season was originally scheduled to start May 15, but a new start date has yet to be confirmed amid the pandemic. The WNBA Draft will still take place April 17 as planned, though the draft has been moved to a virtual format to broadcast on ESPN with no draftees, media, or fans in attendance.
ESPN also announced it will begin airing MLB Encore Tuesdays every week throughout April. The series will see one famous MLB game televised every Tuesday night on ESPN and the ESPN App. The series will debut tonight at 7 p.m. ET with a replay of the September 21, 2001 game between the New York Mets and Atlanta Braves, which was New York City’s first major professional sports event after September 11 and ended with Mike Piazza’s walk-off home run.
Additionally, the ESPN+ streaming service has uploaded full replays of 13 classic MLB games to be watched on-demand. Each game is noted for having either a perfect game or no-hitter, such as Don Larsen’s perfect game in the 1956 World Series and Roy Halladay’s no hitter in the 2010 NLDS.
