Disney's ESPN adds SEC football to lineup starting in 2024
The deal brings some of college football's biggest teams to Disney.
More sports are coming to your phone on ESPN Plus.
Sports fans got a closer look at Disney's plans for ESPN, a sports broadcasting powerhouse that's transitioning from cable TV mainstay into a streaming service.
On Thursday, Disney said it reached an agreement to add Southeastern Conference college football to its schedule beginning with the 2024 season. The conference, home to heavyweights Auburn, Alabama and Georgia, is among the most watched college athletics. The deal will make Disney's ABC network host to the SEC's Saturday afternoon games, as well as some prime time games and the annual conference championship.
Disney, which unveiled the agreement Thursday at its annual investor day presentation, also said it had secured the exclusive rights to the PGA Tour for its ESPN Plus streaming service. The deal includes four live feeds covering up to eight groups per tournament.
Disney, like other media companies, is trying to capture more viewers on streaming services while maintaining revenue from its traditional cable packages, which remain more lucrative. ESPN is a particularly delicate task because conventional cable TV viewership for the sports network towers over the number of its online users. An estimated 80 million households subscribe to a cable TV package that includes live sports, according to MoffettNathanson, compared with 11.5 million subscribers to ESPN Plus. If Disney moves too quickly, it risks losing the big revenue stream generated by ESPN's cable audience.
Disney raised its subscriber forecasts for the sports streaming service to between 20 million and 30 million by the end of fiscal 2024, up from the 8-12 million subscribers it had previously forecast. ESPN Plus is expected to be profitable by 2023.
A full jump to streaming-only would upend television sports, a complex media ecosystem of intricate contracts and gerrymandered broadcast rights. It would sound the death knell for traditional cable and showcase the triumph of cord-cutting.
Disney is moving in that direction. Earlier this year, Disney hiked the price of ESPN Plus by a dollar, to $5.99 a month. A bundle that also includes Disney Plus, ESPN Plus and Hulu with ads will also remain at $12.99 a month.
Like sports leagues themselves, ESPN Plus has been affected by the coronavirus, which postponed major sporting events and truncated some seasons. Basketball and golf resumed after a months-long hiatus, and both the NFL and college football seasons are underway.