Liga MX on ESPN
Posted on March 5, 2013 11:48
Starting this weekend, some Liga MX games will air on the Worldwide Leader’s family of networks in English. Yesterday’s announcement trumpeted ESPN’s partnership with Azteca America, but it goes a lot further than that.
This is pretty huge.
To be sure, this is not the first time Liga MX has been broadcast in the US in English: both Univision and Telemundo have tinkered with the concept on some of their way-down-the-dial properties.
Each team is free to negotiate their own TV rights, much like teams in the NBA and MLB. But those negotiations were a lot like the “pacto de caballeros.” Earlier this year, León became the first team to sign a TV deal outside of the Azteca-Televisa duopoly. Of course, when they have a heavyweight like Carlos Slim as a partner.
ESPN is also a heavyweight, the 800lb gorilla.
ESPN understands the potential. It’s been about a year since they began flashing Ligva MX scores on their bottom line, and they signed on to broadcast all of Mexico’s national team games through 2014. Liga MX (and Copa MX) was the logical move.
Meanwhile, Univision mas moved the majority of their Liga MX games from their air channels to Univision Deportes Network, a channel that has been picked up by very few carriers.
Teams would be silly to not include ESPN when their contracts are being renegotiated. They can match or beat all the zeros that are written on that little piece of paper that is pushed across the table. Granted, there are some teams that have a little more caché than others – Chivas’ rights are a little more attractive than, say, Puebla’s. And adding English language on the Cable TV titan is much, much, more than a sweetener.
And it is something that none of their possible competitors can possibly match.
Last summer, Mexican football was rebranded as Liga MX as a foundation to make the league more attractive to viewers… and advertisers. That means that they have to expand beyond the borders. Despite what a couple of their team owners may think, adding new broadcast partners is a means to the end they envisioned.
Corona Liga MX would mean a lot more to the Modelo group if a lot more eyeballs on both sides of the border and beyond would see it.
Nice, I’ll be able to watch Cruz Azul in English!
Now, if only Cruz Azul were watchable…
m-m-maybe t-they’ll get their sh!t together… right?
Ouch !
Dude, you made me laugh out loud in the office!
As long as the Liga MX games don’t displace any MLS games I’m all for it. I like watching Mexican soccer a lot as the quality of play is very high and the league is far more competitive than the big-money European leagues.
I like MLS better though and still see it as the future of the game at the pro level in our country.
I wish the Spanish language channels would have the English feeds for Liga MX matches (and the telenovelas!) on the SAP button. The MLS game of the week on Univision needs an English SAP feed, too.
I thought you were talking about the English international Liga MX feeds. Those are awesome as they actually let you hear the crowd, where as the Local Spanish feeds make it all about the current gen of horrible announcers.
I wonder how many of MLS’s matches ESPN (in English, not Deportes) will show in comparison….
As many as the Marketing Dept. find lucrative!
…Seriously though – this is all about markets and demand.
This is great news for Pochos like me!!!
does anyone know who the anchors will be?? anything to get away from the idiots on Univision, I also hope the audio feed includes stadium noise as eliminating it kind of makes the games feel less exciting.
I believe ESPN should be focusing on their own home league, MLS, rather then showing a Mexican league. The amount of MLS matches ESPN shows is a joke! They need to up their coverage of MLS, then we should start talking about showing other leagues!
You have no idea how the world works.
Could you clarify something for me Jagau?
As you say this was a deal between Azteca and ESPN.
So as far as we know, the 2 big networks own the rights both local and International for 17 Liga MX clubs correct? (Well maybe 16 not sure about Chivas)
But perhaps in the future, teams could sell the rights separate, say Cruz Azul to Azteca for Spanish and say NBC sports for English.
Doesn’t Chivas already do this? With Spanish Mexico to Televisa but they sell their Spanish USA rights to Telemundo (or they used to).
Stumbled upon matchbuz.com. What a time saver. Is that game worth watching? Impartial spoiler-free Liga MX match ratings from a neutral perspective!
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