By DAVID BARRON
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
As the NBA Finals came to an end Thursday in San Antonio, the curtain rang down on ABC Sports as we have known it for the last 45 years.
ESPN announced Thursday that it will assume all non-production operations of ABC Sports. The Disney Corp. siblings already share advertising operations, and ESPN has handled program acquisitions, including the NBA, for several years.
Mike Pearl, hired last year as ABC Sports executive producer, will continue to oversee over-the-air productions, reporting to ESPN executive Mark Shapiro. An ESPN spokesman said layoffs are expected as a result of the latest consolidation.
ABC Sports will continue to exist as a brand name, and the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians-Communications Workers of America will have jurisdiction over ESPN-produced programs when they air on ABC. But even that presence will shrink after Monday Night Football switches to ESPN in 2006 and Bowl Championship Series games (save the Rose Bowl) move to Fox Sports in 2007.
It won't have much of an impact on some viewers, but Thursday's announcement is a milestone in the history of sports TV.
ABC Sports was born as Sports Programs Inc., a production company founded in 1957 by Edgar Scherick. Scherick was a former ad executive who hired Dizzy Dean to call baseball on CBS and went on to greenlight Batman, Peyton Place and Bewitched for ABC and to produce the films Sleuth, Shoot the Moon and The Stepford Wives.
Scherick hired men like Chet Simmons, Chris Schenkel, Jim McKay and Roone Arledge, and began producing events for ABC before selling Sports Programs to ABC in 1961.
It was the house that Scherick, and Arledge, built, and now it belongs to ESPN.
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Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
As the NBA Finals came to an end Thursday in San Antonio, the curtain rang down on ABC Sports as we have known it for the last 45 years.
ESPN announced Thursday that it will assume all non-production operations of ABC Sports. The Disney Corp. siblings already share advertising operations, and ESPN has handled program acquisitions, including the NBA, for several years.
Mike Pearl, hired last year as ABC Sports executive producer, will continue to oversee over-the-air productions, reporting to ESPN executive Mark Shapiro. An ESPN spokesman said layoffs are expected as a result of the latest consolidation.
ABC Sports will continue to exist as a brand name, and the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians-Communications Workers of America will have jurisdiction over ESPN-produced programs when they air on ABC. But even that presence will shrink after Monday Night Football switches to ESPN in 2006 and Bowl Championship Series games (save the Rose Bowl) move to Fox Sports in 2007.
It won't have much of an impact on some viewers, but Thursday's announcement is a milestone in the history of sports TV.
ABC Sports was born as Sports Programs Inc., a production company founded in 1957 by Edgar Scherick. Scherick was a former ad executive who hired Dizzy Dean to call baseball on CBS and went on to greenlight Batman, Peyton Place and Bewitched for ABC and to produce the films Sleuth, Shoot the Moon and The Stepford Wives.
Scherick hired men like Chet Simmons, Chris Schenkel, Jim McKay and Roone Arledge, and began producing events for ABC before selling Sports Programs to ABC in 1961.
It was the house that Scherick, and Arledge, built, and now it belongs to ESPN.
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