ESPN Scores Big Against NBC

Starting next year, ESPN has successfully outbid NBC for single-network coverage of the Wimbledon championships for the next twelve years, unseating NBC. The reason ESPN is being debated, but most agree that NBC choosing not to air any matches live until 2014, while ESPN would air all quarter and semifinal matches live (as well as early rounds) got ESPN the win.

ESPN has had a long tradition of airing all sports live, regardless of when they are played. This has caused a bit of a rift with fans, some believing it unfair that the East Coast generally gets to watch programming after work, while others believe that in the age of the Internet, live television is needed more than ever to prevent people from watching games on their computer. ESPN has embraced live games so much that ESPN3.com broadcasts several games that would never make it to air on one of ESPN's main networks.

As far as how this will affect the quality of coverage, that's unknown. ESPN may broadcast everything live, but the people behind these games are just awful. Nobody likes ESPN's Monday Night Football with Mike Tirico. Nobody likes Mike Breen and Jeff Van Gundy broadcasting NBA games (thankfully Mark Jackson will now be coaching and away from the microphone). Nobody likes ESPN's baseball coverage where last year, they infamously got every single pick wrong in the 2010 World Series (I'm dead serious, everyone they picked to win lost, including the World Series).

The only thing ESPN has going for it, ironically enough, is it's soccer/football coverage, which is by far the best and most extensive coverage in English in the U.S. They're starting to broadcast MLS games this summer, international club friendlies, as well as broadcasting Euro 2012 next year. The only "problem" with ESPN's soccer/football coverage is Alexi Lalas is publicly no fan of the Mexican national team and has turned away Mexican viewers in the past, something that could be dangerous as ESPN will be the sole provider of Euro 2012 in the U.S.; it will not get any Spanish-language coverage from Univision or Telemundo.

On the NBC side of things, this is a huge blow to its credibility when they already have less and less credibility as time goes on. NBC's refusal to air foreign (and even some domestic ones) sporting events live has greatly alienated their audience, who can very easily look on their phone to see the results that they want to see. As far as next year's London Olympic Games go, only time will tell to see if NBC changes their attitude and starts airing events live on its main network. For the Beijing Games, they did air events live on CNBC, MSNBC, and USA, but NBC still had their infamous "primetime" block to show the "best" of events from the day, usually biased to show what NBC thinks Americans will be most interested in, usually swimming, gymnastics, and track.