American sports television channel (1995?2021)
This article is about the former American cable home of NBC Sports. For the current de facto cable home of NBC Sports, see
NBC Sports on USA Network
.
"Versus (TV channel)" redirects here. For other uses, see
Versus
.
Television channel
NBCSN
(also known as NBC Sports Network) was an American
sports television
channel
owned by the
NBC Sports Group
division of
NBCUniversal
, a subsidiary of
Comcast
. It originally launched on July 1, 1995, as the
Outdoor Life Network
(
OLN
), which was dedicated to programming primarily involving fishing, hunting, outdoor adventure programs, and outdoor sports. By the turn of the 21st century, OLN became better known for its extensive coverage of the
Tour de France
but eventually began covering more "mainstream" sporting events, resulting in its relaunch as
Versus
in September 2006.
In 2011,
Comcast
, the original owner of the network,
acquired
a majority stake in
NBCUniversal
. As a result, Comcast merged the operations of its pay channels with those of NBC. In particular, it aligned the operation of its sports channels with
NBC
's sports division,
NBC Sports
. On January 1, 2012, Versus was rebranded as the
NBC Sports Network
. The branding was later shortened to
NBCSN
. By September 15, 2014, most of NBC Sports' operations, including NBCSN, had been moved to facilities in
Stamford, Connecticut
.
As of February 2020, NBCSN was distributed to 79.879 million homes and was the second most watched cable sports network besides
ESPN
(though some sources included
ESPN2
as a separate network in those figures).
[1]
On January 22, 2021, NBCUniversal announced that the network would cease operations by the end of the year. NBCSN ceased operations on December 31, 2021, with its sports properties moved to
USA Network
,
Peacock
, and other NBCUniversal networks.
[2]
History
[
edit
]
As the Outdoor Life Network
[
edit
]
The channel originally launched as the
Outdoor Life Network
(or
OLN
) on July 31, 1995;
[3]
the name was licensed from
Outdoor Life
magazine. Its programming consisted of hunting, fishing, and outdoor adventure shows. In its early days, the channel reached around one million homes and found most of its carriage via the then-infant platforms of
direct broadcast satellite
services and
digital cable
.
[4]
The network was one of two (the other being
Speedvision
) formed out of a partnership of
Cox Cable
and
Times Mirror
which had combined their cable systems operations a year earlier. Outdoor Life was originally planned to have launched at the beginning of July 1995. However, it was delayed when Times Mirror decided to reassess its media holdings. Times Mirror decided to reduce its stake in the two new networks to 10%; bringing Comcast and
Continental Cablevision
on as partners. The network initially had trouble gaining carriage and was also broadcast on several
low power television
stations.
[5]
In 1999, OLN acquired the U.S. broadcast rights to the
Tour de France
for US$3 million. Coverage of the
Tour
on OLN brought substantially greater viewership to the then fledgling channel, due in part to the then-growing popularity of American rider
Lance Armstrong
. In
2004
, where Armstrong would aim for a record-breaking sixth straight Tour de France title, OLN would devote over 344 hours in July to coverage of the
Tour
, along with documentaries and other original programming surrounding the event ? which was promoted through a $20 million advertising campaign.
[6]
Overall, while its coverage of the Tour de France helped OLN expand its carriage to over 60 million homes, rumors surrounding Armstrong's possible retirement from racing led to concerns over OLN's emphasis on him (to the point that some critics referred to OLN as standing for "Only Lance Network"),
[7]
with critics questioning whether the network could sustain itself without the viewership that Lance Armstrong's presence had brought to its coverage.
[4]
Following the
2005
Tour
(where Armstrong captured his seventh victory in the race, and announced his retirement from cycling afterward), OLN debuted a new lineup of programming?led by the acquisition of
off-network
reruns of the
reality competition series
Survivor
. OLN's executives believed that bringing
Survivor
into its lineup would fit well with the new direction it had planned for OLN, and could attract viewership from fans of the show who had watched it on
CBS
, though it was also the first example to prove that traditional repeats of reality competitions with the results already known was an unviable strategy.
[8]
Around the same period, OLN also acquired the rights to the
Dakar Rally
,
America's Cup
, the
Boston Marathon
, and the
Iditarod
. OLN planned to cover these events in a similar style to how it covered the
Tour
, hoping that its coverage might bring "surprise" results for the channel.
[8]
Due in part to Lance's absence from the
Tour
in 2006, its ratings for live coverage of the first four stages of the race drew in 49% fewer viewers than previous years.
[7]
OLN and the NHL
[
edit
]
OLN interview with
John Lieswyn
after he won the
Stillwater, Minnesota
, Criterion in 2005
In May 2005,
ESPN
rejected a $60 million offer to renew its
broadcasting contract
with the
National Hockey League
into the
2005-06 NHL season
, and the league rejected its alternate proposal for a revenue sharing agreement similar to the one it had established with
NBC
. With the
NFL
also shopping a
new late-season package of Thursday and Saturday night games
to potential broadcasters, speculation began to surface that Comcast would bid on the new NHL contract as its first step to transforming OLN into a mainstream sports channel that could compete with ESPN.
[8]
Comcast had already been involved in NHL broadcasting; at the time, it owned majority control of the
Philadelphia Flyers
, and four
Comcast SportsNet
regional sports networks
.
[9]
In August 2005, ESPN declined to match Comcast's offer, and OLN acquired pay television rights to the NHL beginning in the 2005?2006 season in a three-year deal worth close to $200 million. The new deal would include 58 regular season games on Monday and Tuesday nights, coverage of the
NHL All-Star Game
, conference finals, and the first two games of the
Stanley Cup Finals
.
[9]
With the help of its new NHL package, by June 2006, OLN had now reached 75 million subscribers. However, due in part to OLN's lesser carriage in comparison to ESPN, the NHL's ratings that season had suffered in comparison.
[10]
In 2006, OLN broadcast selected games in the
Arena Football League
's
2006 season
. The channel televised a weekly regular-season game for 11 weeks as well as a wild card playoff game.
[11]
However, the agreement was not renewed and was later picked up by
ESPN
, who also acquired a minority stake in the league's ownership.
[12]
As Versus
[
edit
]
Versus Logo
In April 2006, Comcast announced that it would be renaming Outdoor Life Network to
Versus
in the fall of 2006. As the network had shifted beyond simply "outdoor" programming, the name "Versus" was intended to represent the common element of competition within its lineup.
[13]
OLN's re-launch as Versus occurred on September 25, 2006.
Among the new programming acquired by Versus was a number of
combat sports
, beginning with a series of
boxing
programs promoted by
Bob Arum
's
Top Rank
promotion. The channel also began televising
Chuck Norris
's
World Combat League
, a
kickboxing
promotion featuring a unique round ring without ropes. Versus entered into a partnership with
World Extreme Cagefighting
(WEC) to bring
mixed martial arts
events to the channel, with the first being broadcast live on June 3, 2007. Versus aired all the WEC events, except for
WEC 48
, which aired on pay-per-view, with live preliminary fights being aired on
Spike TV
.
[
citation needed
]
The channel also added a variety of sports events as part of the rebranding, including men's and women's college basketball, high school basketball,
[14]
[15]
a weekly "game of the week" for the
National Lacrosse League
, darts competitions, the
Major Indoor Soccer League
, and the
USA Sevens
, one of the nine tournaments (then eight) that make up the
IRB Sevens World Series
, the top annual circuit in the
sevens
version of
rugby union
.
In 2007, Versus expanded its college football coverage; the network acquired a portion of the rights to the
Mountain West Conference
(as part of the deal, Comcast also took a stake in the conference's new cable network
MountainWest Sports Network
),
[16]
and acquired a package of 10
Big 12
and
Pac-10
football games sublicensed from
Fox Sports Net
(replacing a package it had previously sub-licensed to
TBS
).
[17]
For its inaugural season of college football broadcasts in 2006,
Gary Bender
or
Bob Papa
served as the
play-by-play
announcer, with
Glenn Parker
as the
analyst
and Argy Stathapulos as the
sideline reporter
for Mountain West football game coverage.
[
citation needed
]
In 2008, Versus announced a contract with the
Ivy League
to broadcast at least three games each year beginning in the 2008 season, culminating with the annual
Harvard?Yale rivalry game
. The initial two-year contract was later renewed in 2010.
[18]
Versus secured coverage for the
2007 America's Cup
, which had been a staple on ESPN and ESPN2 for years. The channel began to show qualifying regattas in late 2005, aired the
Louis Vuitton Cup
for challengers in 2007, and the America's Cup match between the Louis Vuitton winner and current champions, won by
Alinghi
of Switzerland in
Valencia, Spain
. In 2006, it picked up American broadcast rights (in conjunction with
The Tennis Channel
) of
Davis Cup
events.
Versus, with
NBC Sports
and the World Championship Sports Network (later
Universal Sports
), broadcast coverage of the
2007 World Championships in Athletics
from Osaka, Japan, as well as the
2009 World Championships in Athletics
from Berlin, Germany.
On January 28, 2008, Versus and the NHL extended their television contract through the 2010?11 season.
[19]
In June 2008, operations were moved from
Stamford, Connecticut
, to Comcast's headquarters in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
.
[20]
On August 7, 2008, the channel announced a 10-year deal with the
Indy Racing League
to broadcast at least 13
IndyCar Series
events a year in HD, beginning in 2009.
[21]
The channel would also broadcast various motorsports series on its
Lucas Oil Motorsports Hour
program such as
USAC
, the
Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series
, and
World Series of Off-Road Racing
.
[22]
The channel aired the
96th Grey Cup
, the championship game of the
Canadian Football League
in 2008.
[23]
The channel began airing games from the
United Football League
in 2009. The first season Championship aired on November 27, 2009. The UFL would return to the channel for a second season in 2010.
[
citation needed
]
On April 5, 2010, Versus debuted
The Daily Line
, a
sports betting
show consisting of a four-person panel (host
Liam McHugh
before moving to NBC Sports, handicapper Rob DeAngelis, comedian
Reese Waters
, and
Jenn Sterger
) who discussed, often with heavy satire, sports-related topics that were popular that day.
[24]
However, the show was cancelled due to low viewership on November 4, 2010.
[25]
It was revived by
NBC Sports Radio
in 2019 after the
PASPA Act
was
declared unconstitutional
, though NBCSN instead blended betting content into regular programming.
[26]
The Ultimate Fighting Championship would air two live events on the channel due to the new contract agreement with UFC sister promotion World Extreme Cagefighting. The first edition of
UFC on Versus
aired on March 21, 2010, headlined by
Brandon Vera
vs.
Jon Jones
in the Light Heavyweight division. The second event aired on August 1 with
Jon Jones
facing
Vladimir Matyushenko
. Also as part of the agreement with the UFC, several UFC Countdown shows would air. A countdown show aired the week of a
pay-per-view
event, usually lasting for one hour, and covering 2?3 of the biggest fights on the card. In August 2011, the UFC announced a new broadcasting deal with the channels of rival
Fox Sports
, which would begin to take effect in November 2011.
[27]
Versus had also struck a deal with the NBA to air 10 regular season
NBA Development League
Saturday night games, as well as six playoff games a year. In total, the channel would air 16 NBA Development League games,
[28]
in addition to 25 hours of NBA specials.
Starting in August 2010, Versus aired nine races of the
NASCAR
Whelen Modified Tour
and NASCAR
Whelen Southern Modified Tour
each Wednesday at 7 p.m. The races originated from a variety of locations, including
Stafford Motor Speedway
, Tri-County Speedway, and Thompson Motor Speedway.
[29]
Merger with NBC Sports
[
edit
]
In February 2011, Comcast acquired a majority stake in
NBC Universal
, and merged its content operations into the company. As part of the acquisition, Versus and Comcast's other sports channels began to be integrated into the
NBC Sports
division. Coinciding with the merger, President Jamie Davis was replaced by Comcast Sports Group president Jon Litner. Litner began to oversee the channel, in addition to his other duties following the Comcast takeover.
[30]
In March 2011, Versus expanded its college football coverage by becoming the pay-TV partner for
NBC's coverage
of
Notre Dame football
, airing replays of Notre Dame games, and the first ever live broadcast of the team's annual spring game. Its coverage began with a marathon of three classic Fighting Irish games on
March 17, St. Patrick's Day
, to serve as a prelude to its coverage of the spring game.
[31]
For the 2011 season, Versus also returned to airing
National Lacrosse League
telecasts with a nine-game package, starting with the
2011 All-Star Game
and culminating with the
Champion's Cup
final.
[32]
Versus would drop the NLL for the league's
2012 season
; U.S. broadcast rights were instead picked up by
CBS Sports Network
.
[33]
Relaunch as the NBC Sports Network / NBCSN
[
edit
]
Logo using the full "NBC Sports Network" name, used from 2012 to just before the
2014 Winter Olympics
In April 2011, NBC Sports and Versus announced they had reached a ten-year extension to their television contract with the National Hockey League worth nearly $2 billion over the life of the contract. As part of the announcement,
Dick Ebersol
, the former chairman of NBC Sports, said that Versus would be renamed "within 90 days" in order to reflect the synergy resulting from the merger.
[34]
However, the announcement of a new name did not come until August 1, 2011, when Comcast announced that Versus would be relaunched as the NBC Sports Network (NBCSN)
[35]
on January 1, 2012. The relaunch coincided with NBC's coverage of the
NHL Winter Classic
, which took place on the same day.
[36]
In an interview with
TV Guide
, president of programming Jon Miller stated that NBCSN was to be positioned as a credible "full-service sports network", dropping
low-brow
programming (such as
Whacked Out Sports
and
The T.Ocho Show
) in favor of focusing on event coverage, and sports news and talk programs, including new original programming.
[37]
NBC also made efforts
[38]
to expand its current broadcasting relationships and acquire new rights for additional sports events to be broadcast on the channel. In the months leading up to the relaunch, NBC struck deals with
Major League Soccer
,
[39]
dropped the
UFL
,
[40]
and added coverage of
college hockey
games.
[41]
On June 6, 2011, it was revealed that NBC Sports would extend its rights to the
Olympic Games
through 2020, outbidding competing bids by Fox Sports and
ESPN
in a $4.38 billion contract. The network began to participate in NBC's overall coverage beginning at the
2012 Summer Olympics
.
[36]
[42]
[43]
Its coverage of the gold medal game between the United States and Japan in
women's soccer
set a new viewership record for the network, with 4.35 million viewers.
[44]
Almost immediately after the rebrand, the shortened moniker "NBCSN" began to be used in TV listings to refer to the network. In July 2013, the network announced its intention to use this abbreviation on an official basis. On August 18, 2013, commentators and graphics began to refer to the network as "NBCSN".
[45]
[46]
The change was made to help streamline its branding in preparation for the
2014 Winter Olympics
, by which time the name change was mostly complete.
[45]
On September 22, 2013, NBCSN broadcast an episode of
Under Wild Skies
?a
hunting
program aired as a
time-buy
by the
National Rifle Association of America
?in which host and NRA lobbyist Tony Makris was shown killing an
African elephant
on a trip to
Botswana
. The network was criticized by the media for airing such material; while NBC responded by pulling the episode due to its "objectionable" content and stating that it would be more "aggressive" towards the content of future episodes of the program.
Under Wild Skies
was pulled from the network entirely after Makris made remarks on an NRA-produced webcast comparing critics of the show to
Hitler
.
[47]
[48]
The network's outdoors block, its final connection with its OLN era, was slowly wound down by 2016 with natural contract expirations, as the outdoor networks of
Kroenke Sports & Entertainment
effectively monopolized the market through their own three networks, along with streaming providers. The editorial standards for those venues also had more tolerance to the firearms-centric genre (and advertiser base) of outdoors programming.
NBCSN simulcast Spanish-language coverage of two matches from the
2018 FIFA World Cup
from corporate sibling
Telemundo
:
Brazil
vs.
Switzerland
on June 17, and
England
vs.
Belgium
on June 28.
[49]
[50]
In December 2018, the yearly ratings rankings for American sports networks saw NBCSN rank second for the first time, ahead of
ESPN2
, which fell below the second spot for the first time in its history.
[51]
Because of Comcast's acquisition of
Sky plc
, NBCSN partnered with the British media firm's
Sky Sports
division on coverage of international events. The first collaboration came at the Premier League
transfer deadline
in January 2019. Two months later, NBCSN added an hour-long simulcast of the
Sky Sports News
channel to its weekday morning lineup, returning that program to the American airwaves for the first time since the discontinuation of
Fox Soccer
in September 2013.
[52]
[53]
Closure
[
edit
]
On January 22, 2021, an internal memo sent by NBC Sports president Pete Bevacqua announced that the network would cease operations by the end of the year, and that
USA Network
and NBC would begin "carrying and/or simulcasting certain NBC Sports programming," including the
Stanley Cup Playoffs
,
IndyCar Series
, and
NASCAR Cup Series
, before NBCSN's shutdown (NBC lost the rights to the NHL to an
ESPN
/
Turner Sports
consortium after the 2020?2021 season).
When NBCSN was shuttered, its programming was effectively merged into USA Network's schedule, with some events also moving to
CNBC
on weekends, freeing NBC Sports from the burden of having secondary programming to fill time without any live sporting events.
Peacock
, NBCUniversal's new streaming service, began to broadcast some of the network's former programming such as
Notre Dame hockey
, and would also simulcast several major sports events held by NBCSN as a transitional move, most notably the opening games of the
2021 Stanley Cup Finals
.
[54]
[55]
The move was cited by industry analysts as a response to the impact of the
COVID-19 pandemic
on the
sports
and
television
industries, the acceleration of
cord-cutting
, as well as formidable competition from rival sports networks such as
ESPN
and
Fox Sports 1
, noting the company saw an overall revenue drop by 19% to $6.72 billion.
[55]
[56]
Following a gradual "wind-down" of operations (even further aggravated by NBC's loss of NHL rights), it was further disclosed as to the process of how NBCSN would cease operations on November 2, 2021; specifically, it was revealed on that date that a majority of NBCSN's sports rights, beginning with rights to
Premier League
soccer, would transfer over to
USA Network
, the
Olympic Channel
(which itself shut down nine months after NBCSN did)
[57]
and
Peacock
, beginning at 12:00:01 a.m. on January 1, 2022; at that time, the network, after
signing off
, would then carry a looping advisory video advising viewers where their programs could be found until January 10, though the provider could simply take the channel dark immediately after sign-off.
[58]
NBC also advised viewers during broadcasts of affected games as to their new location, along with making sure
electronic program guide
listings reflected the channel's closure, and the company's social media was used to advise viewers as well.
[2]
Mecum Auctions already had a secondary content deal with
Motor Trend
and a tertiary deal with
RFD TV
; Motor Trend became its primary television partner at the start of 2022,
[59]
though the fate of other surrounding non-NBC programming such as
PowerNation
programming (which is offered through
its owner's
own streaming service, Vuit), is unknown.
The final live sports broadcast aired on NBCSN was an exhibition
cornhole
"Team USA vs. The World" event (both men's and women's) from
Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
(during the 2021 US Open Cornhole Championships)
[60]
on December 31. It led into the final program, a replay of the second day of Mecum's
Kansas City
auction event from December 3, and following the program the transition to the advisory loop was done without ceremony. Said loop continued until 2:34 p.m. ET on January 10, when it went dark.
[61]
Facilities
[
edit
]
As of September 15, 2014, the entirety of NBC Sports' operations, including NBCSN, moved to a new campus in
Stamford, Connecticut
.
Football Night in America
remained at
NBC Studios in Rockefeller Center
until September 7, 2014, when that program also moved to Stamford.
[62]
Notable personalities
[
edit
]
Announcers, reporters and hosts
[
edit
]
Hockey
[
edit
]
Motorsports
[
edit
]
- Rick Allen
: lead NASCAR lap-by-lap (2015?2021), studio host (2014?2021), reserve IndyCar lap-by-lap announcer (2016?2017), reserve
IMSA
lap-by-lap announcer (2019?2021)
- Jon Beekhuis
: pit reporter (2013?2021), color commentator (2009?2012)
- Townsend Bell
: color commentator (2013?2021), pit reporter (2012)
- Dave Burns
: pit reporter (2015?2021), lead lap-by-lap (2015?2021)
- Jeff Burton
: color commentator (2015?2021), studio host (2014?2021)
- Jac Collinsworth
: Host/Features Reporter (2021)
- Leigh Diffey
: lead IndyCar lap-by-lap announcer (2013?2021), reserve NASCAR lap-by-lap announcer (2015?2021), lead IMSA lap-by-lap announcer (2019?2021)
- Kevin Lee: pit reporter (2010?2021), reserve Indycar lead lap-by-lap (2014?2021), reserve
IMSA
lap-by-lap announcer (2019?2021)
- Dale Earnhardt Jr.
: NASCAR analyst (2018?2021)
- Ray Evernham
: color commentator (2015?2021 ?
Whelen Modified Tour
)
- Dale Jarrett
: studio analyst (2015?2021)
- Parker Kligerman
: studio analyst (2014?2021), color commentator (2015 ?
NASCAR
K&N Pro Series
), pit reporter (2016?2021)
- Kelli Stavast
: pit reporter (2015?2021)
- Katie Hargitt: pit reporter (2015?2021)
- Anders Krohn
: color commentator (2014?2021 ?
Indy Lights
), pit reporter (2017?2021)
- Steve Letarte
: color commentator (2015?2021)
- Robin Miller
: pit reporter (2011?2021)
- Kyle Petty
: studio analyst (2014?2021)
- Ralph Sheheen
: lead lap-by-lap (2015?2021), pit reporter (2016)
- Jason Weigandt: lead lap-by-lap (2012?2021)
- Frank Stoddard
: studio analyst (2014?2021), color commentator (2015 ?
NASCAR
K&N Pro Series
)
- Brian Till
: reserve IndyCar lap-by-lap (2012?2016), reserve
IMSA
lap-by-lap (2019?2021)
- Calvin Fish
: color commentator (2019?2021)
- A. J. Allmendinger
: color commentator (2019?2021), studio analyst (2019?2021)
- Paul Tracy
: color commentator (2014?2021)
- Ricky Carmichael
: color commentator (2019?2021)
- Daniel Blair: reporter (2019?2021)
- Grant Langston
: color commentator (2012?2021)
- Bob Varsha
: reserve lap-by-lap (2013?2014)
- Brian Vickers
: studio analyst (2015?2021)
- Krista Voda
: studio host (2015?2020)
- Dillon Welch: pit reporter (2018?2021)
- Rutledge Wood
: Features reporter (2014?2021)
- Brad Daugherty
: studio analyst (2020?2021)
- James Hinchcliffe
: color analyst (2020?2021)
Soccer
[
edit
]
Mixed martial arts
[
edit
]
Programming
[
edit
]
Event coverage
[
edit
]
Olympics
[
edit
]
Motor sports
[
edit
]
Soccer
[
edit
]
Hockey
[
edit
]
NBCSN broadcast set at the
2017 NHL Entry Draft
Rugby union
[
edit
]
College sports
[
edit
]
Other sports
[
edit
]
WSOF
was formed in 2012, having signed a broadcast deal with the NBC Sports Network. This was the third MMA promotion that NBC Sports has hosted, having broadcast
World Extreme Cagefighting
and
Ultimate Fighting Championship
events when the channel was formerly known as
Versus
.
[71]
NBC Sports had been one of the bidders for the rights to broadcast future UFC events, but lost out to
Fox
.
[72]
However, some journalists regarded WSOF's deal with NBC Sports to be a considerable coup for a debuting promotion, considering NBC Sports' past interest in the UFC.
[72]
Upon the announcement of the broadcast deal, WSOF President
Ray Sefo
stated that the promotion wanted to host 8?10 events per year, whilst holding a one-year deal with NBC Sports.
[73]
However, the next day, an NBC spokesman revealed that the deal only covered WSOF's inaugural event, with the option for more, should NBC hold a positive evaluation.
[72]
On February 4, 2013, it was reported by several news outlets that NBC Sports signed a 3-year deal with WSOF.
[74]
[75]
On December 16, 2012, NBC Sports Network, along with
CNBC
, aired a portion of the
Sunday Night Football
game between the
San Francisco 49ers
and the
New England Patriots
. This was because the game's coverage on NBC was interrupted by
President
Barack Obama
's press conference following the
Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting
. NBCSN will continue to serve as overflow coverage for
Sunday Night Football
and other NFL games covered by NBC in the event the ongoing game is interrupted by an
NBC News
special coverage.
[76]
On July 23, 2013, NBC announced that
coverage
of
NASCAR
racing would return to NBC beginning in the 2015 season under a new contract lasting through 2024. The deal includes broadcast rights to the second half of the
NASCAR Playoffs
and
Xfinity Series
seasons; the majority of which will air on NBCSN.
[77]
[78]
On August 17, 2014, NBCSN aired rain-delayed coverage of the
USGA
's 2014
United States Amateur Challenge
, making it the first
golf
event to be televised on the network.
Original programming
[
edit
]
Original programs aired by the network include
NBC SportsTalk
, and the weekly
CNBC Sports Biz
, which both debuted in the fall of 2011 (the latter ending when
Darren Rovell
moved to
ESPN
as their
sports business
correspondent).
Bob Costas
hosts
Costas Tonight
, which consists of monthly interview episodes, and quarterly
town hall
specials ? the first of which aired from
Indianapolis
on February 2, 2012, as part of NBC's overall coverage of
Super Bowl XLVI
.
[37]
The network also added more documentary-style series, including
36
,
Caught Looking
(a weekly series co-produced with
Major League Baseball
), and
Sports Illustrated
, a monthly series produced in conjunction with the
magazine of the same name
.
[79]
[80]
On August 13, 2012, NBCSN premiered a new morning show,
The 'Lights
, which consists of a 20-minute loop of sports highlights with no on-camera personalities, repeated from 7:00 to 9:00 a.m. ET.
[80]
In 2014, NBCSN premiered a new auto-themed reality series
Mecum Dealmakers
. It was renewed for a second season in 2015.
[81]
In April 2016, NBCSN acquired rights to air the
Dan Patrick
-hosted
Sports Jeopardy!
The premiere run followed nightly
2016 Summer Olympics
coverage, and joined NBCSN's Wednesday night schedule later in October.
[82]
In February 2019, it was announced that
The Dan Patrick Show
would be dropped and replaced by an encore of
PFT Live
and an hour-long simulcast block of British sister channel
Sky Sports News
.
[53]
In April 2020, it was announced that the latter would be replaced by the new
NFL
studio show
NBC Sports Football Flex
on April 13.
[83]
Past carriage disputes
[
edit
]
At the beginning of September 2009,
DirecTV
pulled Versus from its lineup, as it was unable to reach terms on a rate increase demanded by Comcast. In public statements (including a message shown on the channel which formerly carried Versus), DirecTV scolded Comcast for its "unfair and outrageous demands", and considered the company to be "simply piggish" in its demands for higher rates, as it derisively pronounced Versus as "a
paid programming and infomercial
channel with occasional sporting events."
[84]
On March 15, 2010, an agreement was reached between the two sides and Versus returned to DirecTV's lineup. The channel was returned to its original package on the service, Choice Xtra.
[85]
The network then drastically reduced its paid programming blocks to a more traditional late night-only arrangement under NBC management (between 3 a.m. and 7 a.m. Eastern time), and mainly limited their offerings to trusted advertisers such as
Time Life
. The paid programming itself was also subject to pre-emption with live sports from Asia or Australia, and fully put on hiatus during Olympic coverage.
High definition
[
edit
]
A
1080i
high-definition
feed of the network was launched in January 2007. Initially, its HD feed was shared with sister network
Golf Channel
in an arrangement marketed as
Versus/Golf HD
; Golf Channel programming was broadcast during the daytime hours, and Versus programming was broadcast during the evening and primetime hours with some schedule variation during Tour de France coverage. The shared channel was replaced by individual HD feeds for both channels in December 2008.
[86]
In May 2013, the network's
standard-definition
feed was converted to a
widescreen
presentation with
letterboxing
to duplicate the display seen on the high-definition feed in line with their competitors' presentations of their SD channels.
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|
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| Sports on NBC
| |
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Sports on other networks
| |
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| |
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