ESPN to launch August 3rd

Same. Until they have all their boxing contracts sorted (if they get them) and their UFC (if they get that) and whatever else I won't subscribe.

Is that £9 just for one channel aswell??

 

if your subscribed to sky hd than you'll get espn sd and espn hd but if you haven't got sky hd than you'll just get espn sd.

If you aren't subscribed to sky at all than it'll be £12 for espn sd.

 

Well I've got Sky. Not HD but I don't give a **** about that anyway. So yeah basically one channel.

 

Their main product is Prem League and as the season starts August they need to be up and running then.

Boxing, if they have it in any depth will be an add-on. If they don't get any up front contracts - not one offs - then I'll be saving my money.

 

as ive always said there is no evidence that they intend to start covering boxing,people have been specualting and astarting threads but it dosentr gurentee that you will get to see boxing on espn

 

this seems to all be about sky subscibers and deals that sky are doing. Any news on whether or not Virgin Media are getting it?

 

By the sounds of it- and that's if you're a subscriber of Sky Sports. See the new monopoly taking shape? **** 'em, the same odd footy game like Setanta showed every week is simply not worth nearly a tenner a month. Robbing ****s- I wonder how long it will take them to realise that it's not gonna work unless they broaden up their horizons. I mean, how many people over here actually wanna watch repeats of American 'Football'?atsch

 

Pretty crap.

£12 for Setanta got me Boxing, SPL, Racing UK, UFC, Premiership and some other stuff.

£12 ESPN gets me Premiership and some other stuff.

 

The only people that will buy this will be people who already have Sky Sports but still cant get enough football. If you arent paying £15 for Sky sports for 3 channels why pay £12 for one. At least the Setanta deal had lots of other stuff Sky didnt have so appealed to a different market.

 

Exactly. At the minute, ESPN will run as the current ESPN America show does, just with EPL and SPL (not officially confirmed yet) included as well. The real losers are the US sports fans who will have to pay £9 for a watered down US sports channel. October will be busy as theres EPL, potentially SPL, Baseball World Series, NHL and College Football. I can't see the room for Boxing there, especially as live stateside stuff, which is what they are most likely to show will clash with their live NHL or MLB that night, particularly Saturdays popular Hockey Night in Canada.

Before y'all say, well fook the Baseball we want Boxing. If ESPN chose to show Boxing in these Friday/Saturday slots ahead of the Baseball etc. they will potentially lose a lot of their subscriber base. I don't honestly think Boxing would be more popular for ESPN than the US sports-we've had a US sport channel for 7 years or so now, and everybody on here knows a boxing channel wouldn't work.

Remember nothing has been even mentioned that ESPN will show Boxing in the UK-its just the hopes of a few people on boxing forums. Whether they show Boxing in the US means nothing. For example, over there they show the NBA, which we dont get. So far their channel is EPL and US sports, almost certainly the SPL and maybe the UFC

Internet boxing fans may say ESPN are the best hope of getting Boxing back on TV, when an honest man will tell you sky are the more likely option.

 

I already subscribe to Sky Sports but this is where I now draw the line. I'm not paying a tenner a month for a couple more footy games; that just doesn't make sense, IMO. They must be crazy if they think this is gonna work as it stands at the moment. I'm quite eager to see what else they sort out before the 3rd: one thing is for sure, though- we know they will soon have contacts based over here and we can start lobbying them for what we want.:bbb

 

Yeah. I had Setanta and though it was value for money as it was cheaper than Sky Sports and had more on it that I wanted to watch. But now ESPN's main selling point is the Premiership if I was getting a Sports package would be much better to get 3 Sky Sports channels. seems as if the only way it makes sense is as an 'add on' for people who already get Sky Sports but want more premiership games or people really into US Sports, but even then your getting a worse deal than you did with Setanta.

 

So with my setanta box, can I get this or do I have to buy SKY?! Please say no.

 

I don't know much about this stuff but is it possible that this is just a crafty way for Sky to get access to the extra games given up by Setanta and charge extra for them?

IIRC Sky wern't allowed to bid on that package for monopoly related reasons, maybe they just cut a deal with ESPN to buy the games and launch a "new" channel on Sky to show them?

 

Get a 'dodgy' box