THIS SHOW WAS THE BOMB!!!





February 05, 2004
NFL pressures ESPN to drop 'Playmakers'
The corporate bully known as the National Football League has used its leverage to force ESPN to pull the plug on the uneven but occasionally brilliant drama series Playmakers, according to the NY Times and San Jose Merc. The series focused on the dark side of pro football, including spousal abuse, drug use, racism, sexism and homophobia. Excerpt from the Times:

The 11-week dramatic series examined subjects like drugs and sex on the fictional Cougars team without ever mentioning the words "National Football League." Early on, the series prompted Paul Tagliabue, the N.F.L. commissioner, to complain to Michael D. Eisner, the chief executive of the Walt Disney Company, ESPN's parent company. Soon after Tagliabue's call to Eisner, ESPN stopped showing promotional commercials for the series during its Sunday night N.F.L. broadcasts.
And from the Merc:

Viewers liked the show, with more than 2 million tuning in each week -- an audience five times what ESPN had been drawing in the same time period. The series also made many TV critics' top 10 lists.
But the numbers and critical praise could not compete with the fact that ESPN's biggest ratings by far come from the Sunday night NFL games it airs under a $4.8 billion, eight-year contract. In addition, Disney also owns ABC, whose top-rated show is "Monday Night Football.''

That gives the NFL a lot of clout in ESPN's world and, as ESPN vice president Ron Semaio said last month, the cable channel "is not in the business of antagonizing our media partners.''









[Edited 3/21/08 16:51pm]

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