ESPN Eyes 2014, 2016 Olympic Games

NEW YORK, August 20: ESPN has plans to bid for the
television rights to the 2014 and 2016 Olympics, and would carry more live
coverage, regardless of the time zone, than NBC traditionally has done.

ESPN chief George
Bodenheimer said ESPN/ABC intends to be in on the bidding when the
International Olympic Committee (IOC) begins the auction process. NBC holds the
rights to the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver and the 2012 Summer Games in
London.

“Our DNA is different than
theirs,” John Skipper, ESPN’s executive VP for content, is quoted as saying in The New York Times.
“We serve sports fans. It’s hard in our culture to fathom tape-delaying in the
same way they have. I’m not suggesting it wasn’t the smart thing for them to
do, but it’s not our culture. We did Euro 2008 in the afternoon. We’ve done the
World Cup in the middle of the morning. We have different audiences.”

The IOC has not set a date for
selling the TV rights to the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, and the 2016
Summer Games, whose host city will be chosen in October 2009, with Chicago, Rio
de Janeiro, Madrid and Tokyo all in the running.

—By Kristin Brzoznowski