ESPN Classic to close

[zeebre12]

From AT&T website:
For ESPN Classic fans
On November 30, our rights to carry ESPN Classic expire. As the cost of sports content continues to rise, few distributors now offer ESPN Classic. Instead of game repeats, they are focusing on live competition. AT&T continues to offer popular regional, national, and international sports events with major teams, conferences, and pro franchises. We regret any inconvenience.
What providers are left carrying the channel?
It's a wonder ESPN didn't convert it into an ESPN Extra/3 overflow type of channel showing live sports that were not on the main channels. Surely ESPN has enough rights for it to show live sports even when certain times when all channels are being used

 

[ejb1980]

From AT&T website:
For ESPN Classic fans
On November 30, our rights to carry ESPN Classic expire. As the cost of sports content continues to rise, few distributors now offer ESPN Classic. Instead of game repeats, they are focusing on live competition. AT&T continues to offer popular regional, national, and international sports events with major teams, conferences, and pro franchises. We regret any inconvenience.
What providers are left carrying the channel?
It's a wonder ESPN didn't convert it into an ESPN Extra/3 overflow type of channel showing live sports that were not on the main channels. Surely ESPN has enough rights for it to show live sports even when certain times when all channels are being used

Um, they have a whole bunch of ESPN3 channels for that and have for years - ch 788 to 798. ESPN Classic is SD only. Why would they create a new SD-only overflow?

 

[EarDemon]

The phasing out of ESPN Classic has been going on for years. It was announced over a decade ago that the channel would be transitioned to an On Demand service and has been on auto pilot ever since. Dish dropped it in 2014, Comcast and Altice dropped it in 2017. Verizon removed it earlier this year, Charter removed it a week or two ago, DirecTV loses it in 4 weeks. As MSOs sign new contracts with Disney, ESPN Classic is removed shortly afterward.

ESPN Classic was awesome before ESPN bought it out and it was called the Classic Sports Network. I think the downfall of the channel was when all four major sports leagues started their own networks. Why let ESPN have the rights to archived games, when you can air them on your own network? ESPN Goal Line is another channel that should go away. Often times it's simulcast on other ESPN channels. Actually most of the ESPN channels can go, they are no longer about live sports coverage, and haven't been for years. Now it's just a bunch of talk shows with windbags giving their opinions like they actually matter and people shouting over each other.

With the only sports I care about these days being hockey and NASCAR, ESPN has almost no mention of them. Last I knew, Barry Melrose would come on as a contributor every so often for the NHL and Rickey Craven for NASCAR. I remember when ESPN and ABC had contracts for the NHL in the '90s with ESPN National Hockey Night and NHL 2Night and then when they lost the contract with the NHL, hockey was dead to them. Same thing with NASCAR, there was RPM 2Day and RPM 2Night when ESPN had the contract in the '90s

 

[ejb1980]

The phasing out of ESPN Classic has been going on for years. It was announced over a decade ago that the channel would be transitioned to an On Demand service and has been on auto pilot ever since. Dish dropped it in 2014, Comcast and Altice dropped it in 2017. Verizon removed it earlier this year, Charter removed it a week or two ago, DirecTV loses it in 4 weeks. As MSOs sign new contracts with Disney, ESPN Classic is removed shortly afterward.

ESPN Classic was awesome before ESPN bought it out and it was called the Classic Sports Network. I think the downfall of the channel was when all four major sports leagues started their own networks. Why let ESPN have the rights to archived games, when you can air them on your own network? ESPN Goal Line is another channel that should go away. Often times it's simulcast on other ESPN channels. Actually most of the ESPN channels can go, they are no longer about live sports coverage, and haven't been for years. Now it's just a bunch of talk shows with windbags giving their opinions like they actually matter and people shouting over each other.

With the only sports I care about these days being hockey and NASCAR, ESPN has almost no mention of them. Last I knew, Barry Melrose would come on as a contributor every so often for the NHL and Rickey Craven for NASCAR. I remember when ESPN and ABC had contracts for the NHL in the '90s with ESPN National Hockey Night and NHL 2Night and then when they lost the contract with the NHL, hockey was dead to them. Same thing with NASCAR, there was RPM 2Day and RPM 2Night when ESPN had the contract in the '90s

Nascar is still a thing? I haven't seen any mention of it on ESPN in years. There is something called F1 on there now but it seems to be worldwide. Great time to change the channel. Barry Melrose does appear on ESPN sometimes. ESPN shows plenty of live games, on what planet are you living?

 

[Radioguy41]

Everything you need to know about how seriously ESPN takes sports can be summed up in these few words - ESPN is reported to be offering Stephen A. a contract extension to the tune of $10M a year.

I wish there was an emoticon for gagging. I dropped ESPN a couple of years ago and do not miss it.

 

[EarDemon]

Yes NASCAR is still a thing. The rise in popularity in Formula One in the US can be attributed to Team Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton.

Lets see ESPN has one NFL game a week, Sunday and Wednesday Night Baseball last I knew, and about 100 NBA games between ESPN and ABC. The do have a lot of college football, I give them that. Oh yeah they have plenty of other totally relevant events too like poker, and if they haven't already, they'll probably get into the growing fad of eSports. Gotta reach out to those dimwitted millennials somehow you know. As it stands, ESPN and ESPN 2 used to be awesome channels, with plenty of live sports, sport specific highlight shows and magazine shows. Now it's mostly loudmouthed know-it-alls giving their worthless options on subjects that don't matter.

The ESPN I knew had ABC MNF, ESPN SNF, NFL Primetime with Berman and TJ, NASCAR Qualifying, Practice, Happy Hour and live races, RPM 2Day, RPM 2Night, race simulcasts on ESPN 2 with alternate camera angles and no announcer commentary, just the sounds of the engines, NHRA, Thursday Night Hockey, Fire on Ice, NHL 2Night, Conference Finals and Cup Finals on ESPN and ABC.

When was the last time the ESPN Alternate channels were used? I remember one of the big advantages of satellite over cable was having the alternates and being able to choose what regional games you watched. It was like a poor mans mini NHL CI for me, and I think they were used for baseball as well. In the late 90s/early 2000s, my areas shock jock FM morning show was sponsored for a few years by the areas biggest Dish Network retailer. They used to play promos all the time about having six ESPNs (Original, 2, News, Classic, Alt , 2 Alt) when the local cable company only had two.

 

[ejb1980]

Yes NASCAR is still a thing. The rise in popularity in Formula One in the US can be attributed to Team Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton.

Lets see ESPN has one NFL game a week, Sunday and Wednesday Night Baseball last I knew, and about 100 NBA games between ESPN and ABC. The do have a lot of college football, I give them that. Oh yeah they have plenty of other totally relevant events too like poker, and if they haven't already, they'll probably get into the growing fad of eSports. Gotta reach out to those dimwitted millennials somehow you know. As it stands, ESPN and ESPN 2 used to be awesome channels, with plenty of live sports, sport specific highlight shows and magazine shows. Now it's mostly loudmouthed know-it-alls giving their worthless options on subjects that don't matter.

The ESPN I knew had ABC MNF, ESPN SNF, NFL Primetime with Berman and TJ, NASCAR Qualifying, Practice, Happy Hour and live races, RPM 2Day, RPM 2Night, race simulcasts on ESPN 2 with alternate camera angles and no announcer commentary, just the sounds of the engines, NHRA, Thursday Night Hockey, Fire on Ice, NHL 2Night, Conference Finals and Cup Finals on ESPN and ABC.

When was the last time the ESPN Alternate channels were used? I remember one of the big advantages of satellite over cable was having the alternates and being able to choose what regional games you watched. It was like a poor mans mini NHL CI for me, and I think they were used for baseball as well. In the late 90s/early 2000s, my areas shock jock FM morning show was sponsored for a few years by the areas biggest Dish Network retailer. They used to play promos all the time about having six ESPNs (Original, 2, News, Classic, Alt , 2 Alt) when the local cable company only had two.

The ESPN alt channels are used but not like they used to be. They use it for the ESPN2/ABC mirror and stuff like that. They have brought the stuff that used to be regional to a national audience so it's better. Let's not forget about the ESPN3/ECE channels starting at 788. My local cable compay doesn't have those, but I am sure many do.

No one except old rednecks care about racing so they don't cover it. I am sure someone covers it. Hockey is on NBCSN and NHL Network now. ESPN+ has NHL but I think ESPN+ is a ripoff since we already pay for ESPN and should not have to pay them more. There are games on all the ESPN channels virtually every night. The conference networks show conference-related content.

Yeah, there are a lot of talk shows. Only hardcore republicans think they talk politics - they really don't. They ran that terrible sportscenter at 6 with the loudmouths for a while, but that failed and it's gone (and so are the loudmouths). Stephen A needs to go, what a loser, but what are they supposed to show in the morning/afternoon when there aren't any live events? Sometimes there are baseball games on, but MLB Network often has the day games. Poker is very little of ESPN programming, it's mostly on other sports channels. eSports aren't Sports, usually on TBS and Eleven sports, but I also fear when ESPN starts wasting airwaves with that.

I do think that they try too hard with their big broadcasts. The announcers on MNF and Sunday Night Baseball are just terrible and make the game nearly unwatchable. And there is WAAAAAY too much NBA talk. And I am personally not a fan of the obsession with many networks showing international soccer now, but I guess that is okay because there is an audience for it in the US and it doesn't interfere with our sports due to time zones and the talk shows really don't talk about it. But of course the most popular team (Barcelona) is on a channel that Directv dropped so there's that.

 

[Ronnie-]

Ok, this last post is clearly very close to insulting members, and heads into the political category. Both of which are not allowed. Tone it back please.

 

[CycloneSat]

I believe this applies to U-Verse as well.

 

[JohnL]

Steve A Smith?? I think he uses the A instead of his complete middle Name of "ASSWHOLE" (as in the WHOLE of him is a GIANT ANUS). The guy is a total loud mouth Jerk OFF, you have to a complete idiot if you manage to PISS of Jim Rome (Notorious but fair, blow hard).

John

 

[AMike]

I have missed the original concept of Classic Sports before ESPN acquired it. I used to enjoy watching the old NFL weekly highlight shows from the 60's and 70's. I can now find those on YouTube.

 

[DWS44]

Nascar is still a thing? I haven't seen any mention of it on ESPN in years.

Nope...they folded up and closed shop. Obviously, if its not on ESPN, it doesn't exist, right?

No one except old rednecks care about racing so they don't cover it. I am sure someone covers it.

 

[SamCdbs]

Here goes.

- ESPN Classic. This format has simply been made obsolete by the internet. If you really want to watch a decades ago sportsball game, you can do so, for free, on You Tube or else wise.

- The broader discussion about ESPN. Yes, ESPN is political when it should not be. Yes, ESPN vastly over-covers the NBA in proportion to that sport’s (average game, less than 1% watch) role is the whole milieu of sports. Yes, ESPN, since the early 00s, has, to the extent it can (some things are just too big to ignore) ignored sports and leagues it does not have rights to.

- 99% of the value in ESPN is games. More or less 7-11 weeknights, and noon to midnight weekends, with some exceptions. The rest of the time is really just filler. Bluntly the day audience is two types of people. ESPN, with all NBA all the time sports argument shows caters to one of those groups. The sad thing is that none of the other sports channels have the sense to see that there is another daytime group out there, and, rather, Fox and NBC tried to just duplicate ESPN’s NBA programming, CBS doesn’t try, and the sport specific channels are uneven.

 

[Juan]

You forgot to mention hot dog eating

Yes NASCAR is still a thing. The rise in popularity in Formula One in the US can be attributed to Team Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton.

Lets see ESPN has one NFL game a week, Sunday and Wednesday Night Baseball last I knew, and about 100 NBA games between ESPN and ABC. The do have a lot of college football, I give them that. Oh yeah they have plenty of other totally relevant events too like poker, and if they haven't already, they'll probably get into the growing fad of eSports. Gotta reach out to those dimwitted millennials somehow you know. As it stands, ESPN and ESPN 2 used to be awesome channels, with plenty of live sports, sport specific highlight shows and magazine shows. Now it's mostly loudmouthed know-it-alls giving their worthless options on subjects that don't matter.

The ESPN I knew had ABC MNF, ESPN SNF, NFL Primetime with Berman and TJ, NASCAR Qualifying, Practice, Happy Hour and live races, RPM 2Day, RPM 2Night, race simulcasts on ESPN 2 with alternate camera angles and no announcer commentary, just the sounds of the engines, NHRA, Thursday Night Hockey, Fire on Ice, NHL 2Night, Conference Finals and Cup Finals on ESPN and ABC.

When was the last time the ESPN Alternate channels were used? I remember one of the big advantages of satellite over cable was having the alternates and being able to choose what regional games you watched. It was like a poor mans mini NHL CI for me, and I think they were used for baseball as well. In the late 90s/early 2000s, my areas shock jock FM morning show was sponsored for a few years by the areas biggest Dish Network retailer. They used to play promos all the time about having six ESPNs (Original, 2, News, Classic, Alt , 2 Alt) when the local cable company only had two.

Sent from my SM-G950U using the SatelliteGuys app!

 

[TheRatPatrol]

ESPN Goal Line is another channel that should go away. Often times it's simulcast on other ESPN channels.

If you watch Goal Line on 615 there are no commercials and the channel is on longer then when its on the other ESPN channels. They should move it to channel 210.

Let's not forget about the ESPN3/ECE channels starting at 788.

They should put those games starting on channel 211 making use of the dash channels (211-1, 211-2 etc). I never understood why those were in the high 700’s, I’m sure they get forgotten about.

They should rename ESPN News to ESPN 3, maybe ESPN U to ESPN 4?

 

[EarDemon]

You forgot to mention hot dog eating

Sent from my SM-G950U using the SatelliteGuys app!

I didn't mention that because July 4th at Noon is the only time I watch ESPN anymore. Not so much for the hot dog eating contact, but for the epic intros by George Shea. The guy is awesome and is the best thing ESPN has going for it.

If you watch Goal Line on 615 there are no commercials and the channel is on longer then when its on the other ESPN channels. They should move it to channel 210.


They should put those games starting on channel 211 making use of the dash channels (211-1, 211-2 etc). I never understood why those were in the high 700’s, I’m sure they get forgotten about.

They should rename ESPN News to ESPN 3, maybe ESPN U to ESPN 4?

More than likely DirecTV has the ESPN College Extra channels in the high 700s as a hold over from from the Game Plan/Full Court days. On Charter, in L-TWC areas with the National Channel Lineup, the 8 ESPN CE channels are grouped with the rest of the college sports channels in the upper 300s.

370 - ESPN U HD
371 - ESPN Goal Line HD
375 - PAC 12 Network HD
376 - PAC 12 Network Los Angeles HD
377 - PAC 12 Network Arizona HD
378 - PAC 12 Network Washington HD
379 - PAC 12 Network Oregon HD
380 - PAC 12 Network Mountain HD
381 - PAC 12 Network Bay Area HD
382 - Big Ten Network HD
383 - Longhorn Network HD (Texas only)
384 - SEC Network HD
385 - SEC Network Alternate
388 - ACC Network HD
392-399 - ESPN College Extra HD

 

[EarDemon]

Ok, this last post is clearly very close to insulting members, and heads into the political category. Both of which are not allowed. Tone it back please.

Nothing about it I would consider it insulting. Everything is true and I am proud to be a self proclaimed blue collar redneck. I'm not old though, unless you consider mid 30s old, but all things considered I would rather be old then young these days.

 

[ejb1980]

Nothing about it I would consider it insulting. Everything is true and I am proud to be a self proclaimed blue collar redneck. I'm not old though, unless you consider mid 30s old, but all things considered I would rather be old then young these days.

Holy crap, we are around the same age?

 

[ejb1980]

If you watch Goal Line on 615 there are no commercials and the channel is on longer then when its on the other ESPN channels. They should move it to channel 210.


They should put those games starting on channel 211 making use of the dash channels (211-1, 211-2 etc). I never understood why those were in the high 700’s, I’m sure they get forgotten about.

They should rename ESPN News to ESPN 3, maybe ESPN U to ESPN 4?

I agree about 210 and 211. They should just call the ECE channels ESPN3 since that's what they are. ESPN U is a good name for that channel, I think. I have always wanted to see them all mirrored so it would have 210 and 211 used like you said, but also leave them in the college sports section in the 600s and also mirror ESPNU there, but I know they won't do that. I used to think that ESPN Deportes would make a good fit on 211 but if you only have the Spanish package, it would be very out of place. Same with Fox Deportes, but that used to be in 2 places on the guide back in the day. FS1 and FS2 should be together, too. I have long thought the whole Directv lineup needs a re-do but that's for another discussion...

Anyway, does anyone know if we are keeping ESPN Classic on-demand like (I think) other providers did?

 

[EarDemon]

Holy crap, we are around the same age?

Chronologically/physically, I guess so. Otherwise, probably not. I've always held a disdain for my age group and those younger than me and do so now more than ever. Granted there are some good eggs out there like Preston Sharp though.

As a kid I spent my recess talking with teachers and other adults. As a teenager I would always favor talking and hanging out with with those in their 60s, 70s and 80s versus those in my own age range. At my current job I spend most of the time listening to those who are older and wiser and fit in better with them. When I worked at Best Buy with 20-somethings and their highbrow college talk and and using profanity every other word it made me sick, if there was a customer walked in wearing a Vietnam or Korea Veteran hat I would gravitate toward them and start by thanking them for their service. I have very little in common with those in my age bracket and I thank God for that every day.

I'm sick of the showboating, I'm sick of the self righteousness, I'm sick of the holier then thou attitudes, I'm sick of the lack of grace, I'm sick of the lack of respect and most of all I'm sick that your talent on their field is more important then who you are as a person. See none other than the treatment of Tim Tebow versus Aaron Hernandez. That is why I have given up on just about all pro sports.