ESPN Website to Show Video From Games

By Michael Hiestand

The key to Olympic TV is exclusivity: Even if a Games is staged in a faraway time zone and needs to be shown tape-delayed in the USA, the network owning the U.S. TV rights still has a monopoly.

So this is unprecedented: NBC, for February’s Torino Games, will share video footage with ESPN.

But just online. And in a limited way. Ultimately, though, anything spurring interest in an Olympics helps the network broadcasting it.

NBC will supply espn.com with two-minute highlight videos each day during the Games. The highlights, narrated by NBC’s Bob Costas, will be promoted on espn.com’s home page, along with other links meant to drive espn.com users to nbcolympics.com — the NBC network site that drew about 13.8million separate users during the 2004 Athens Summer Games.

NBC and ESPN declined to say whether either made payments in the deal, which began Monday, when NBC logos started appearing on espn.com’s home page.

Espn.com is an obvious promotion platform for NBC. Tops among sports sites, it often draws more than 15million separate users a month, with about 75% of those users logging on to video clips.

But while NBC is giving ESPN a taste of the online action, it’s just an appetizer: NBC’s site will offer hours of video footage during the Games, including the runs and routines of all U.S. athletes as well as the top-five finishers in all events.

No live Olympics footage will air online as NBC, which paid $613million for U.S. TV rights to the Torino Games, continues to protect that investment.

(c) Copyright 2005 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.