DIS - Game on. ESPN makes a bid for U.S. Premier League rights

The competition on the pitch for the rights to broadcast and stream the English Premier League in the United States is heating up, with ESPN (NYSE:DIS) entering the bidding war. Burke Magnus, ESPN's (DIS) president of programming and original content confirmed the bid at an event in New York on Tuesday, according to the soccer industry publication World Soccer Talk. In making ESPN's bid, Magnus called soccer one of the "tentpole" pieces of programming for the ESPN+ streaming service. "We ran our process. We did it with discipline. We'll see," Magnus said. "We hope we understand what they were looking for as part of the process." NBC (NASDAQ:CMCSA) currently pays approximately $150 million a year for the broadcast and streaming rights to the Premier League in the U.S., and shows games on its flagship network, as well as NBC Sports and its Peacock streaming service. NBC's contract expires at the

For further details see:

Game on. ESPN makes a bid for U.S. Premier League rights