ESPN is on schedule to land in L.A. in 2009 - Cable sports giant's five-story building near Staples Center will complement the hub in Bristol, Conn.
West Coast fans who have long suspected an East Coast bias from Bristol, Conn.-based ESPN can begin to rest easier, because the cable sports giant is on track to open by spring 2009 a full-fledged broadcast production facility across from Staples Center.
The five-story ESPN building that is taking shape will house an ESPN Zone restaurant on the first two floors and two television production studios with digital control rooms on upper floors. One studio will become home for the late-night edition of its signature "SportsCenter" that now is produced on the busy Bristol campus. ESPN also will house its 710 radio station studios next door in an office building now under construction.
"The scope of this project makes sense on a lot of different levels," said ESPN President George W. Bodenheimer, who was in town last week. "And, frankly, having toured it today, I feel very good about our decision to come out here."
Bodenheimer declined to state the cost of the new building. But, during a groundbreaking two years ago for the entertainment district that will surround Staples Center, television industry insiders speculated that the building would cost ESPN about $100 million.
One broadcast industry engineer recently estimated the cost of digital technology for the West Coast television studio at between $35 million and $45 million, with related construction costs of about $20 million -- not including the restaurant, which will open late next year.
ESPN executives are still wrestling with how to introduce fans to a bicoastal "SportsCenter," with early shows originating in Bristol and the late edition coming from L.A. The network regularly incorporates feeds from studios in New York City, Washington and Charlotte, N.C., but the show's hosts always have been in Bristol.
ESPN hopes to make the switch in a manner that won't confuse viewers. For example, there's a good chance that the two studios will be identical in appearance, and ESPN must decide if broadcasts will be regularly labeled as "live from Los Angeles."
The network that reaches about 94 million U.S. homes has yet to announce what other programming will originate in the new facility. But one studio is large enough to accommodate a studio audience, and Bodenheimer said that the L.A. facility "can only mean good things for ESPN Deportes," the network's Spanish-language channel.
- ESPN Plans Studios Next to Staples Center Sep 16, 2005
- DISHING IT OUT - ESPN, the Little Network That Could, Finds There's 24-Hour Sports Audience Apr 19, 1988
- ESPN's studio in L.A. debuts Apr 06, 2009
