ESPN West goes south

Concedes regional sports territory in Southern California to Fox

The ESPN expansion train was derailed last week after plans for a Southern California-based regional sports network were scrapped at the last minute. The Disney-owned cable network's entire plan to enter the profitable regional sports business could be in jeopardy.

ESPN West, which was set to launch this fall and to televise the majority of the Disney-owned Anaheim Angels baseball and Mighty Ducks hockey home games, was going to be ESPN's first attempt in the localized sports game. ESPN already has four national networks (ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNEWS and ESPN Classic Sports), and the plan to move into regional sports seemed like the next logical step, analysts say.

But failure to get sufficient cable carriage and to provide enough high-quality sports programming around the clock apparently made the road too rough in Southern California and could put a crimp in ESPN's plans for regional outlets elsewhere across the country.

ESPN executives would not comment on their future development plans, but the network put out a statement defending the decision to halt plans on ESPN West. In the statement, ESPN authorities shifted the blame for canceling ESPN West from its own lack of cable carriage to a purely financial move by Anaheim Sports, a separate Disney division that runs the Anaheim Angels and Mighty Ducks.

"We are certain ESPN West would have been a top-quality service, but we respect the team's interest in having immediate access to the largest possible distribution, for their benefit and that of their fans," the ESPN statement said.

When it became clear last month that ESPN West was not going to be up and running in time to give the Angels and Mighty Ducks sufficient cable coverage in the greater LOS Angeles region, Anaheim Sports executives opened talks with Fox Sports West executives. Fox Sports West and Fox Sports West 2 have carried both the Angels and Mighty Ducks telecasts for the past few years and enjoy all but a monopoly on Southern California professional and college sports television rights.

With the announcement to end ESPN West, ESPN executives also announced new 10-year pacts for both the Angels and Mighty Ducks on Fox Sports West and Fox Sports West 2.

"We consider it a very positive day at our network," says Kitty Cohen, vice president and general manager of Fox Sports West and Fox Sports West 2. "A couple of weeks ago they [Disney executives] made a call and said they would entertain an offer."

Cohen says that she and other Fox executives, who were getting ready for life with ESPN West in their backyard, were caught off guard by ESPN's decision. Fox Sports West 2 was going to lose its 40 Mighty Ducks telecasts next season, and the start-up ESPN network and Fox Sports West were going to share coverage of the Angels during the 1998-99 campaign.

"We knew they didn't have the distribution, because we would have heard that from the local cable operators," Cohen says of ESPN West's apparent lack of cable carriage. "We knew they were having difficulty getting distribution, just as we had getting [Fox Sports] West 2 up and running two years ago. But we didn't think it would call for them to scrap the whole thing altogether."

ESPN West's demise should help Fox Sports West 2 increase carriage from its current 2.8 million subscribers to nearly 4 million over the next year or so, Cohen says. Fox Sports West reaches close to 5 million homes in Southern California, Nevada and Hawaii.

In addition to the new deals with the Angels and Ducks, the two Fox Sports networks currently have exclusive cable coverage of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Los Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Kings and Los Angeles Clippers. Fox also has long-term deals with the top college teams in the area, including USC and UCLA.

ESPN's effort to enter the regional sports business was going to be the network's first attempt in the local game after staying the national course for so long. While ESPN is the most profitable national cable network, sports or nonsports, Fox has quickly taken over the regional sports business and has built up a war chest with the rights to more than 70 professional and college teams across the country. Fox also has entered the national sports cable business through Fox Sports Net and certain events on FX.

The rivalry between Fox parent News Corp. and ESPN parent Walt Disney Co. was expected to move to the regional sports arena with ESPN's entrance into Southern California. But from the tone of the ESPN statement, it appears that Disney is going to stay out of the local game for a while. "While we will continue to consider regional opportunities if they make good business sense, ESPN's success has been built through national distribution."

ESPN West goes south

Concedes regional sports territory in Southern California to Fox

The ESPN expansion train was derailed last week after plans for a Southern California-based regional sports network were scrapped at the last minute. The Disney-owned cable network's entire plan to enter the profitable regional sports business could be in jeopardy.

ESPN West, which was set to launch this fall and to televise the majority of the Disney-owned Anaheim Angels baseball and Mighty Ducks hockey home games, was going to be ESPN's first attempt in the localized sports game. ESPN already has four national networks (ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNEWS and ESPN Classic Sports), and the plan to move into regional sports seemed like the next logical step, analysts say.

But failure to get sufficient cable carriage and to provide enough high-quality sports programming around the clock apparently made the road too rough in Southern California and could put a crimp in ESPN's plans for regional outlets elsewhere across the country.

ESPN executives would not comment on their future development plans, but the network put out a statement defending the decision to halt plans on ESPN West. In the statement, ESPN authorities shifted the blame for canceling ESPN West from its own lack of cable carriage to a purely financial move by Anaheim Sports, a separate Disney division that runs the Anaheim Angels and Mighty Ducks.

"We are certain ESPN West would have been a top-quality service, but we respect the team's interest in having immediate access to the largest possible distribution, for their benefit and that of their fans," the ESPN statement said.

When it became clear last month that ESPN West was not going to be up and running in time to give the Angels and Mighty Ducks sufficient cable coverage in the greater LOS Angeles region, Anaheim Sports executives opened talks with Fox Sports West executives. Fox Sports West and Fox Sports West 2 have carried both the Angels and Mighty Ducks telecasts for the past few years and enjoy all but a monopoly on Southern California professional and college sports television rights.

With the announcement to end ESPN West, ESPN executives also announced new 10-year pacts for both the Angels and Mighty Ducks on Fox Sports West and Fox Sports West 2.

"We consider it a very positive day at our network," says Kitty Cohen, vice president and general manager of Fox Sports West and Fox Sports West 2. "A couple of weeks ago they [Disney executives] made a call and said they would entertain an offer."

Cohen says that she and other Fox executives, who were getting ready for life with ESPN West in their backyard, were caught off guard by ESPN's decision. Fox Sports West 2 was going to lose its 40 Mighty Ducks telecasts next season, and the start-up ESPN network and Fox Sports West were going to share coverage of the Angels during the 1998-99 campaign.

"We knew they didn't have the distribution, because we would have heard that from the local cable operators," Cohen says of ESPN West's apparent lack of cable carriage. "We knew they were having difficulty getting distribution, just as we had getting [Fox Sports] West 2 up and running two years ago. But we didn't think it would call for them to scrap the whole thing altogether."

ESPN West's demise should help Fox Sports West 2 increase carriage from its current 2.8 million subscribers to nearly 4 million over the next year or so, Cohen says. Fox Sports West reaches close to 5 million homes in Southern California, Nevada and Hawaii.

In addition to the new deals with the Angels and Ducks, the two Fox Sports networks currently have exclusive cable coverage of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Los Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Kings and Los Angeles Clippers. Fox also has long-term deals with the top college teams in the area, including USC and UCLA.

ESPN's effort to enter the regional sports business was going to be the network's first attempt in the local game after staying the national course for so long. While ESPN is the most profitable national cable network, sports or nonsports, Fox has quickly taken over the regional sports business and has built up a war chest with the rights to more than 70 professional and college teams across the country. Fox also has entered the national sports cable business through Fox Sports Net and certain events on FX.

The rivalry between Fox parent News Corp. and ESPN parent Walt Disney Co. was expected to move to the regional sports arena with ESPN's entrance into Southern California. But from the tone of the ESPN statement, it appears that Disney is going to stay out of the local game for a while. "While we will continue to consider regional opportunities if they make good business sense, ESPN's success has been built through national distribution."