Monday Night Football to ESPN

[thinga87]

Let's hope one of the Australian pay-tv networks pick up the NBC game though, because Fox Sports Australia show one, sometimes 2 games from their Sunday line up, while ESPN Aus/NZ show both Sunday night and Monday night football.

[WSU151]

Esentially Sunday Night Footbal now becomes the big deal game, becuase they have fleixibillty to put the best game at that time, whiel changing a game from Sunday to Monday is hard, and ESPN wont mind having the lesser game any way.

I've read that NBC won't be able to switch the Monday night games to Sunday night - instead, if NBC decides that a scheduled Sunday afternoon game is a better matchup than what is scheduled at night, the network will allowed to switch those games. All that would be needed is a "time change" notice. ESPN will only be able to make the Sunday-Monday switch.

Also, is it me or is NBC getting a pretty sweet deal out of this?? $600 million over six years for the essentially the best game of the day? ESPN has agreed to 1.1 billion over eight years...not exactly proportional.

And I'm surprised that ABC was losing money. I've always thought that the networks can charge much higher rates for ad time because they will (in theory) attract a much larger audience. Sitcoms always generate more money on network television than cable - why not Monday Night Football?

[zman65]

I read, though, that FOX and CBS first get to reserve a few of their plum afternoon games before NBC gets its choice of the Sunday night game.

Still, a good deal for NBC....a guaranteed B+ game every week.

[Cujo]

Just wondering, but will NBC still be able to keep Arena League games when they get the NFL back?

I also hope NBC brings back the music they used in the mid 90's, although i doubt they do. It was a pretty catchy theme.

[DEAD!]

Crap!

TSN in Canada always showed Sunday Night Football because Canada doesn't get ESPN. Now that ESPN has Monday Night Football and NBC has Sunday Night, we're still stuck with WWE Monday Night RAW on TSN instead.

--Roger "Time?" Clemente.

I think TSN will still show the Sunday night game. Not all areas of Canada get NBC, right?

[Roger Clemente]

Crap!

TSN in Canada always showed Sunday Night Football because Canada doesn't get ESPN.  Now that ESPN has Monday Night Football and NBC has Sunday Night, we're still stuck with WWE Monday Night RAW on TSN instead.

--Roger "Time?" Clemente.

I think TSN will still show the Sunday night game. Not all areas of Canada get NBC, right?

I know that....I'm talking about the Monday night game.

--Roger "Time?" Clemente.

[NJTank]

Arena Football is in the offseason so I think it will still be on NBC

[DEAD!]

Crap!

TSN in Canada always showed Sunday Night Football because Canada doesn't get ESPN.  Now that ESPN has Monday Night Football and NBC has Sunday Night, we're still stuck with WWE Monday Night RAW on TSN instead.

--Roger "Time?" Clemente.

I think TSN will still show the Sunday night game. Not all areas of Canada get NBC, right?

I know that....I'm talking about the Monday night game.

--Roger "Time?" Clemente.

Oops. Well isn't there any station in the Maritimes that gets Monday Night Football?

[Roger Clemente]

Crap!

TSN in Canada always showed Sunday Night Football because Canada doesn't get ESPN.  Now that ESPN has Monday Night Football and NBC has Sunday Night, we're still stuck with WWE Monday Night RAW on TSN instead.

--Roger "Time?" Clemente.

I think TSN will still show the Sunday night game. Not all areas of Canada get NBC, right?

I know that....I'm talking about the Monday night game.

--Roger "Time?" Clemente.

Oops. Well isn't there any station in the Maritimes that gets Monday Night Football?

Only unless someone other than ESPN is carrying it because TSN has obligations to WWE Monday Night RAW. We never had this problem before because we can get ABC in the Maritimes on the basic cable package. TSN would always show the Sunday Night game (and probably will continue to do so) because Canada doesn't get ESPN, even though we can get NBC on basic cable too.

Then again, if TSN can get Monday Night Football, then there is no problem.

--Roger "Time?" Clemente.

[DEAD!]

Well you might not have to worry about this after this season

From the Globe and Mail

By WILLIAM HOUSTON

Wednesday, April 20, 2005 Updated at 1:13 AM EST

From Wednesday's Globe and Mail

E-mail William Houston Read Bio Latest Columns

NBC is in. A tradition at ABC ends.

That tells part of the story about a new National Football League broadcast agreement that has shaken up sports TV in the United States. But the rights deal also will have an impact on television in Canada.

In 2006, Monday Night Football, a 35-year staple on ABC, will move to cable channel ESPN, which is owned along with ABC by Walt Disney Co.

Canadian networks will be interested in picking up the ESPN telecast because it will be exclusive (ESPN is not available in Canada), but TSN will have the inside track as its contract with the NFL gives it rights to whichever game ESPN is airing. At this point, TSN — of which, ESPN is a minority owner — is in the second of a four-year agreement with the NFL and carries ESPN's Sunday night NFL game.

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But here is TSN's dilemma: On Monday night, it airs WWE Raw, which has been one of the network's leading audience producers for the past 10 years.

Will TSN stick with WWE Raw on Mondays or opt for the NFL? The answer is, almost certainly, the NFL.

Right now, TSN's Sunday night football game draws as many viewers as Raw (350,000). An NFL telecast is 3½ hours long compared with Raw's two hours. Therefore, there's more air time for advertising. And the NFL is a sport, as opposed to Raw, which isn't.

Now, let's look at the Sunday night game. Beginning in 2006, NBC will take over from ESPN. Because NBC is widely available in Canada, picking up the NBC feed is not attractive to a Canadian cable channel.

But airing a U.S. feed does have appeal to a conventional broadcaster, because it's allowed to simulcast and insert its own commercials.

Will Global Television, which owns rights to the 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. Sunday NFL games, also pursue the 8 p.m. game? Perhaps, but probably not. Global has a strong Sunday prime-time lineup without football. So does CTV.

Rogers Sportsnet could bid for the Sunday or Monday game, but it's locked into a heavy Toronto Blue Jays and baseball postseason schedule in September and October, plus regional hockey in November and December.

It's more likely that TSN will make a move to acquire the Sunday night game, as well as the Monday night game, and perhaps also a late-season eight-game package of Thursday and Saturday night telecasts, which the NFL has yet to sell to a U.S. network.

So, look for more NFL content on TSN, starting in 2006. WWE Raw, likely to be cut loose by TSN, would be an attractive property for Sportsnet or The Score.

.....

[MC Buffalo]

This announcement really amounts to a whole lot of nothing. Having Monday Night Games move to ESPN will not affect nearly as many fans as some would lead you to believe.

I won't pretend to have exact figures, but the percentage of households without basic cable or satellite television in the US is probably in the single digits.

If there wasn't a real big uproar when the NFL moved one game a week to Cable with it's TNT/ESPN Sunday package the first year they did it, then I doubt anyone is going to be upset about the cable game being the Monday game instead of Sunday.

And the biggest plus of this move is the games will kick off at 8:40 instead of 9:05 so people on the East Coast can watch the games and still get to bed at a decent hour for work in the morning.

[Mac6674]

I'm glad the games will start at least a little earlier; it's hard to watch the whole thing if you have a job to get up for in the morning.

I don't get all the hate of the ESPN announce team; I think Joe Theismann's excellent. He criticizes players and refs, while lots of guys just make excuses for them no matter how egregiously they screw up. That said, Madden and Michaels are a great team and should be doing primetime games.

[TFoA]

I don't get all the hate of the ESPN announce team; I think Joe Theismann's excellent. He criticizes players and refs, while lots of guys just make excuses for them no matter how egregiously they screw up.

Criticizing the players, I can understand. But come on, they practically complain about almost everything they do

[Mac6674]

I just like that they don't defend the refs; most of the announcers go out of their way looking for reasons why a call would be blown, whereas the ESPN crew (Theismann especially) calls out the refs when they make a mistake. Most of the other guys just buy into whatever the NFL is selling.

My least favorite guy, though, is Dan Dierdorf; he used to make me nuts when he did MNF. He seems to focus on one guy and then not shut up about him no matter what's going on. "the 49ers were able to make that kick because of the amazing positive attitude that just flows from Jerry Rice at all times; did you know that his touch can heal babies?"

[officeglenn]

But here is TSN's dilemma: On Monday night, it airs WWE Raw, which has been one of the network's leading audience producers for the past 10 years.

Will TSN stick with WWE Raw on Mondays or opt for the NFL? The answer is, almost certainly, the NFL.

Looks like TSN has indeed opted for MNF over RAW: TSN.ca

The TSN.ca story makes no mention of what will happen to RAW, but with SmackDown! already on The Score, it makes the most sense for it to wind up there.

(Sorry for dragging up this old thread, but I figured there wasn't enough new information here to warrant a new one.)