August 28, 2006. Why does that date have a significance? It was the final, official broadcast of what was known as ABC Sports. The sports division of the network had been dissolved into sister network ESPN to create ESPN on ABC. While that’s not a bad thing to have the “Worldwide Leader In Sports” to produce all of your sports telecasts, the aura of ABC Sports was officially gone. What was once the leader of all sports in America was no more. Fans will now have a watered-down ESPN network now on their dial, then having the likes of Keith Jackson at the helm on Saturday afternoons saying, “Helloooooooo everybody!”
15 years have passed since this day. For a long while, sports on the weekends on ABC had been relegated to an anthology show called “ESPN Sports Saturday”, while the number of live events were far in between, as College Football, the NBA and Little League World Series were the only live events the once proud network were showing. Combat sports were a staple of the network back in the day, but boxing hasn’t been on ABC since 2000, when a fight between Jose Luis Castillo and Stevie Johnston were on the airwaves, and since then, nothing. The network also televised its final NFL game in February 2006 in Super Bowl 40. The NFL hadn’t been relevant on the network outside of the few playoff simulcasts from ESPN, and nothing seemed to be happening on a bigger stage any time soon.
Then, change happened at the very top of the network. Long time president of ESPN and ABC Sports, John Skipper, resigned his position in December 2017. That created a vacancy and a void to now lead both divisions. Enter Jimmy Pitaro. A longtime executive at Disney (who owns both ABC and ESPN), Pitaro was tasked to lead the sports division and give it more of a presence, including repairing a relationship with the NFL that had been strained at best due to some of the journalistic stories ESPN ran about the league in the mid 2010’s. But, while that may have been one of the major tasks Pitaro was given, the other, was to restore sports on ABC. Given what has happened in the years since, it’s hard to imagine that he hasn’t done that.
Since Pitaro has taken over, many high-profile events have either debuted or return to ABC. The first being the NFL Draft. What was mostly a cable TV show on ESPN and NFL Network over the years, ABC, for the first time, had its own production of the Draft. Not a simulcast of what was being shown on ESPN, but coverage led by College Gameday host Rece Davis. Another live event created just for ABC…the NBA, in prime time, on a Saturday night. Given what the network has been through over the past 15 years, having the return of a major league sport in prime time was a big boost to see it on ABC. It had given the network something that it hasn’t had since 2006, a major property in prime time of its own (outside of Saturday Night Football, which has been a giant for the network).
As stated before, combat sports, in particularly boxing, hasn’t been on the network since 2000. That all changed in January 2021, as the UFC marked its first broadcast on the network ever, and ABC’s first combat sporting event since the above-mentioned Castillo-Johnston bout. This weekend, the network will commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the Fight of the Century, between Joe Frazier and Muhammed Ali, with the original broadcast that was on ABC’s Wide World of Sports digitally remastered and prepped for broadcast for 2021. There has also been more college basketball games shown on the network then at any time in the past two decades, as the network has been the home for the SEC Tournament games over the past few years. And then, it’s the big one.
According to Touchdown Wire, Disney will get back into the Super Bowl rotation with the next NFL media rights contract. What that entails is the Super Bowl will be back on ABC as early as Super Bowl 57, something that could not be thought of even a decade ago. Even more, while not officially announced, Monday Night Football will return in some form on the network, with many games being simulcast on ABC with this new contract.
So, will this be the return to relevance for ABC Sports? Or even the return of the brand? At this stage, nothing is in the works. But, with more live events happening on the network, the return of the Super Bowl, and increased Monday Night Football schedule, the NBA and more combat sports happening on the network, one has to think, can it really happen? Only time will tell, and maybe the only person that knows this, is one Jimmy Pitaro.
- Additional information via https://www.britannica.com/topic/ABCs-Wide-World-of-Sports; as well as https://archive.org/details/broadcastingtele65unse/page/n194/mode/1up?view=theater
- Infographic created by Melvin J Jones, using Piktochart
1216 Sports Radio Network 