ESPN is huddling with National Football League management about keeping NFL Prime Time, one of cable's highest-rated fall series, alive in another time slot in fall 2006.
The talks come as the popular pro football post-game hour, which draws between 4-5 million viewers an episode, exits its early Sunday eve time slot on ESPN at the end of the regular season after 18 years. When NBC takes over Sunday night games from ESPN next fall, NBC gets first rights to the Sunday afternoon game highlights at the heart of Prime Time. Those highlights will appear on NBC's planned pregame hour.
ESPN is talking with the league about running Prime Time after NBC's game at around 11 p.m. ET, the slot in which SportsCenter now appears, according to an ESPN spokesperson. If the NFL doesn't let them use game highlights in that slot, ESPN may move the show to Mondays next fall, before an expanded Monday Night Countdown, which will precede its airings of Monday Night Football.
NFL spokesperson Brian McCarthy says he hasn't fielded any complaints yet from cable operators or NFL Prime Time fans about the possible demise of the show. "You won't hear anything, if you hear anything, until next season," he adds. "We would not reconsider if they did protest." --Simon Applebaum
http://cableworld.com/cgi/cw/show_mag.cgi?pub=cw&mon=120505&file=espnscramblesfor.htm
The talks come as the popular pro football post-game hour, which draws between 4-5 million viewers an episode, exits its early Sunday eve time slot on ESPN at the end of the regular season after 18 years. When NBC takes over Sunday night games from ESPN next fall, NBC gets first rights to the Sunday afternoon game highlights at the heart of Prime Time. Those highlights will appear on NBC's planned pregame hour.
ESPN is talking with the league about running Prime Time after NBC's game at around 11 p.m. ET, the slot in which SportsCenter now appears, according to an ESPN spokesperson. If the NFL doesn't let them use game highlights in that slot, ESPN may move the show to Mondays next fall, before an expanded Monday Night Countdown, which will precede its airings of Monday Night Football.
NFL spokesperson Brian McCarthy says he hasn't fielded any complaints yet from cable operators or NFL Prime Time fans about the possible demise of the show. "You won't hear anything, if you hear anything, until next season," he adds. "We would not reconsider if they did protest." --Simon Applebaum
http://cableworld.com/cgi/cw/show_mag.cgi?pub=cw&mon=120505&file=espnscramblesfor.htm
