For ESPN, the day of the Super Bowl game is a very difficult day: the broadcast rights of this highly anticipated football game are controlled by NBC, CBS and Fox TV stations in turn, while ESPN only has some broadcast rights of playoffs .
In order to deal with the Super Bowl on the 51st Fox TV, ESPN chose to broadcast the e-sports competition: When countless Americans and even some Chinese people (Tencent Super Bowl live video room once had 2.108 million people) watched the Super Bowl, ESPN's main channel was the finals of the Paris Division of the FIFA 17 Professional League (or replay).
"We need to have a show to be broadcast when the Super Bowl event is on; and we broadcast the FIFA 17 Pro League Paris Division Finals, not to do anything for the Super Bowl." John Lakers, vice president of ESPN's program and career acquisitions, said that at the same time, he believes there is a difference between those who watch esports and those who watch Super Bowl.
Although at this critical moment of Super Bowl, eSports has taken on a role of "Since you don't want to go, then I'll do it." But there is no doubt that ESPN is passionate about this emerging sport. Last January, ESPN launched its first esports channel and purchased a large number of broadcast rights for esports events over the next year. Just last week, they also purchased broadcast rights for games such as Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Overwatch and League of Legends, which are broadcast for five days a week and often over 200 hours a year.
