This article is about the sports division of NBCUniversal. For the former cable channel, seeNBCSN. For sports on USA Network produced by NBC, seeNBC Sports on USA Network.
In 2000, NBC declined to renew its broadcast agreement withMajor League Baseball (MLB). In2002, NBC was additionally outbid byESPN andABC for theNational Basketball Association (NBA)'s new broadcast contract, ending the league's twelve-year run on NBC.
Former logo for NBC Sports, used from 1989 until 2011.
During this era, NBC experimented with broadcasting emerging sports. In 2001, NBC partnered with theWorld Wrestling Federation (WWF) to establish theXFL – a new football league which introduced modified rules and debuted to tremendous, but short-lived fanfare, only lasting one season (NBC shared broadcast rights to the league's games, which were mainly held on Saturday nights, withUPN). In2003, NBC obtained the broadcast rights and a minority interest in theArena Football League (AFL). NBC televised weekly games on a regional basis, as well as the entire playoffs. The deal lasted four years, after which the league and NBC parted ways.
Beginning with the1999 NASCAR Winston Cup Series, NBC began its foray intoNASCAR.NBC, along withFox andTNT, obtained the broadcast rights of the top two series – theNASCAR Cup Series andNASCAR Xfinity Series – in a six-year deal, beginning in 2001. NBC televised the second half of the season and alternated coverage of theDaytona 500 withFox. In December 2005, NBC announced that it would not renew its agreement with NASCAR. In 2001, NBC obtained the broadcast rights to horse racing'sTriple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing in a five-year deal.
In 2004, NBC reached a broadcast agreement with theNational Hockey League (NHL). The revenue-sharing deal called for the two sides to split advertising revenue after NBC recouped the expenses. Games were supposed to begin airing on NBC during the2004–05 season, however a leaguelockout that resulted in the cancellation of that season delayed the start of the contract until the second half of the2005–06 NHL season.NBC televised regular season games at first on Saturday afternoons before moving the telecast to Sundays, Saturday and Sunday afternoon playoff games, and up to five games of theStanley Cup. Additionally in 2008, NBC broadcast the2008 NHL Winter Classic, an outdoor NHL game played on New Year's Day atRalph Wilson Stadium, a success in attendance and television ratings. The following year's Winter Classic would become the most-watched regular season game in 34 years.[2] In addition to this regular season success, Game 7 of the2009 Stanley Cup Finals was watched by an average of 8 million viewers, the highest ratings for an NHL game in 36 years.[3]
Former logo of NBC Sports, used from 2011 until 2023
In January 2011,Comcast finalized itsacquisition of a majority share inNBC Universal. As a result of the merger, the operations of Comcast's existing sports networks, such asGolf Channel andNBCSN, were merged into an entity known as theNBC Sports Group. NBC Sports' senior vice president Mike McCarley additionally became Golf Channel's new head.[4] NBC Sports' golf production unit was merged with Golf Channel, along with NBC's on-air staff, with that unit rebranding under the banner "Golf Channel on NBC", while Versus was reformatted toward a more mainstream audience, renamed the NBC Sports Network and eventually rebranded asNBCSN.[5]
The merger also helped influence an extension of NBC Sports' contract with the NHL; the 10-year deal – valued at close to $2 billion, unified the cable and broadcast television rights to the league and introduced a new "Black Friday"Thanksgiving Showdown game on NBC, along with national coverage for every game in theStanley Cup playoffs.[6] On July 3, 2011,ESPN obtained the exclusive broadcast rights toThe Championships, Wimbledon in a 12-year deal, ending NBC's television relationship with The Championships after 42 years.[7]
From 2012 until 2015,Major League Soccer (MLS) games were shown on NBC and the NBC Sports Network. This included the broadcast of two regular season games, two playoff games, and two national team matches on NBC and 38 regular season games, three playoff games, and two national team matches on NBC Sports Network.[8] Since the 2013–14 season NBC Sports has also held the rights to televisePremier League soccer in English (primarily on NBCSN) and Spanish (onTelemundo andUniverso), through a $250 million deal, replacingESPN andFox Soccer as the league's U.S. broadcasters.[9]
NBC Sports held broadcast rights to theFormula One (formerly held bySpeed andFox Sports) from 2013 until 2017. The majority of its coverage (including much of the season, along with qualifying and practice sessions) aired on NBCSN, while NBC aired the Monaco Grand Prix,Canadian Grand Prix and the final two races of the season, which in the first year of the deal included theUnited States Grand Prix. All races were also streamed online and through the NBC Sports Live Extramobile app.[10][11][12] They lost the broadcast rights toESPN beginning from the 2018 season.[13][14]
NASCAR returned to NBC Sports properties in 2015 under a ten-year deal, with NBC once again airing the second half of theNASCAR Cup Series andNASCAR Xfinity Series seasons. While no specific financial details were disclosed, NBC reportedly paid 50% more thanESPN and TNT (who took over the portion of the season previously held by NBC) combined under the previous deal.[16][17]
On June 7, 2015, amid its loss of rights to theUSGA's championships toFox (including theU.S. Open), NBC Sports andThe R&A agreed to a twelve-year deal to televiseThe Open Championship,Senior Open Championship, andWomen's British Open on NBC and Golf Channel, beginning in 2017.[19] Existing rightsholder ESPN opted out of its final year of its agreement for the tournaments, with the Open subsequently debuting a year early in 2016.[20]
Universal Sports ceased operations in November 2015. NBCUniversal acquired the rights to the content that was previously held by Universal Sports Network. Much of the programming moved to eitherUniversal HD, NBCSN and NBC Sports Live Extra.[21]
From 2016 until 2018, NBC Sports held the rights toPremiership Rugby, the top division of Englishrugby union, through a three-year deal. The contract included up to 24 regularly-scheduled games on NBCSN per-season, and up to 50 streaming. Its first live match was on March 12, 2016, whenLondon Irish hostedSaracens F.C. atRed Bull Arena inHarrison, New Jersey.[22]
In June 2016, NBC Sports launchedNBC Sports Gold, a suite of sport-specific over-the-top subscription services that would included expanded and overflow coverage of its properties.[23]
On July 15, 2017. NBCUniversal relaunched Universal HD asOlympic Channel, a network that would carryOlympic sports programming as a complement to its long-standing agreement to cover the Games.[24][25]
In early 2018, it was announced that NBC Sports would renew its contract with theIndyCar Series (continuing a relationship with NBCSN which began in 2009 as Versus),[26] through 2021, and acquire the broadcast television rights previously held byABC. NBC televises eight races per-season since 2019, including the series flagshipIndianapolis 500, with the remaining races airing on NBCSN as before. An IndyCar package is also offered through NBC Sports Gold.[27][28] Shortly after, NBC announced a six-year agreement with theInternational Motor Sports Association beginning in 2019, including theWeatherTech SportsCar Championship, with the majority of coverage on NBCSN.[29]
Following the launch of NBCUniversal's streaming servicePeacock, NBC Sports began to migrate some of its overflow content (including the Premier League and other NBC Sports Gold services) to the service.[30] On June 29, 2020, Fox sold the last seven years of its contract to air USGA tournaments to NBC, regaining rights to the U.S. Open for the first time since 2015.[31][32]
In January 2021, it was reported that NBCUniversal planned to shut down NBCSN by the end of the year; an internal memo cited increased competition from streaming services and the other mainstream sports networks as reasoning.[33][34] The channel was officially shut down on December 31, 2021;[35] its remaining programming rights were moved to other NBCUniversal platforms, particularly USA Network and Peacock.[35]
NBC's contract with the NHL expired after the2020–21 season, with the league signing new contracts withESPN andTNT.[36][37]
On April 6, 2022, NBC Sports announced a deal to carry a package of Sunday afternoon MLB games on Peacock branded asMLB Sunday Leadoff beginning in the2022 season.[38][39][40] NBC Sports declined to renew its deal after the2023 season, with the package moving toRoku instead.[41][42]
On July 1, 2022, NBC Sports announced that Olympic Channel would shut down as a linear channel on September 30, 2022.[43][44]
On August 18, 2022, NBC Sports announced a seven-year deal to carryBig Ten Conference college athletics across its platforms beginning in the 2023–24 academic season. This contract will most notably include a new package of primetime Big Ten college football games on NBC beginning in the 2023 season, as well as a package of college basketball and Olympic sports coverage on Peacock.[45][46]
Beginning with the 2023 NFL season, Peacock exclusively streams at least one regular season game per season. Most notably, Peacock exclusively streamed theMiami Dolphins–Kansas City Chiefs wild card playoff game during the 2023 season.[47][48] The game drove 2.8 million sign-ups to Peacock and averaged 23 million viewers.[49][50]
On June 11, 2024,TNT Sports officially announced a 10-year deal with theFrench Open, ending a broadcasting arrangement with NBC Sports dating back to 1983.[53][54] Two days later,IndyCar andFox agreed to a deal to broadcast theIndyCar Series, ending its 15-year partnership with NBC Sports.[55]
On June 27, 2024, NBC Sports and theBig East Conference announced a six-year deal to begin in the 2025–26 academic year. NBC Sports will carry more than 60 men’s and women’s basketball regular season and tournament games. Peacock begins its coverage in the 2024–25 academic year with 25 regular season games and five early round and quarterfinal conference tournament games in men's basketball.[56][57]
On July 23, 2024, Comcast confirmed during a conference call with investors that theNBA would return to NBC Sports in the 2025–26 season under an 11-year agreement; an official announcement was released by the NBA and NBC Sports the following day. NBC and Peacock will carry 100 regular season games throughout the season, including Monday night games on Peacock, regional Tuesday night games, and a package of Sunday night games following the conclusion of NFL season. NBC will also carry a doubleheader onMartin Luther King Jr. Day, coverage ofAll-Star Weekend, and a slate of playoff games (including six conference finals over the length of the agreement). Rights to theNBA Finals will remain exclusive toABC. The agreement also includes broadcasting rights to theWomen's National Basketball Association (WNBA). NBC Sports' WNBA package includes more than 50 regular-season and first-round playoff games, seven WNBA semi-finals, and threeWNBA Finals. WNBA games will air on NBC, USA Network, and Peacock.[58][59][60][61]
In 1964, NBC televised the1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo; in 1972, NBC televised the1972 Winter Olympics for the first time. 1980 would prove to be a stinging disappointment for the network; after contentious negotiations, NBC won the broadcast rights to the1980 Summer Olympics. After theSoviet Union invaded Afghanistan, the United States and 64 other countriesboycotted the event. NBC substantially scaled back its coverage and lost heavily in advertising revenue. In 1988, NBC televised the1988 Summer Olympics inSeoul. Since then, it has branded itself as "America's Olympic Network", televising every Summer Olympic Games since the Seoul event, as well as everyWinter Olympic Games since2002 Winter Olympics. In total, NBC has aired 13 Summer and Winter Olympics, the most by any one U.S. network. The Olympic Games have also become an integral part of the network.
In 1998, Ebersol was named president of NBC Sports and Olympics.
The2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver were watched by a total of 190 million viewers,[62] including 27.6 million viewers of the gold medal game in men's hockey.[63]
During the2014 Winter Olympics inSochi, Russia, over 500 hours of the games were broadcast across five NBC-owned television channels (NBC, NBCSN,CNBC,MSNBC andUSA Network), with 1,000 hours being streamed digitally.[64] In January, the company announced some exclusive digital-only streaming of the 2014 Olympics via the NBCOlympics.com website and the NBC Sports Live Extra app forAndroid andiOS, including exclusive content such as Gold Zone, Olympic Ice and NBC's Olympic News Desk.[65]
With the premiere ofSunday Night Football, NBCUniversal hired Troika Design Group to design an overall visual identity for its coverage, including branding, on-air graphics, and other visual elements.[66]
Concurrent with the relaunch of Versus as NBC Sports Network on January 2, 2012, and the2012 NHL Winter Classic, NBC Sports also launched a comprehensive redesign of its branding, including a new on-air graphics design built around the NBC peacock, and an updated logo for the division as a whole (replacing a logo that had been in use since 1989). The new design was also intended to be modular, allowing it to be expanded for use in larger events across multiple networks (such as theSuper Bowl and theOlympic Games).[67] A refreshed design for on-air graphics was introduced on January 1, 2015 (in time for the2015 NHL Winter Classic and NFL playoffs), with a cleaner and brighter visual appearance.[68]
NBC began using dedicated graphics packages specifically forSunday Night Football duringSuper Bowl LII, and unveiled a second redesign for the 2022 season duringSuper Bowl LVI.[69][70] NBC similarly diverged for its Premier League coverage in 2019, adopting elements of its new British siblingSky Sports.[71] In 2023, NBC transitioned college football (which had continued to use the 2015 graphics) to new graphics derived from theSunday Night Football graphics introduced in 2022.[72] The new college football graphics were, in turn, adapted by the NBC Sports Regional Networks for their own use in September 2024.[73]
IMSA on NBC – Marty Snider, Dave Burns,Parker Kligerman, Kevin Lee,Brian Till, Dillon Welch, Georgia Henneberry, Matt Yocum, Hannah Newhouse, Chris Wilner
.svg){kind=logo}
