The Early Days of ESPN: 300 Daydreams and Nightmares is “surely is one of the great sports stories and arguably one of the great business stories, too,” says the book’s author, and ESPN’s founding executive producer, Peter Fox, who soldiered on despite critics’ insistence that an all-sports network could never work. Here, Fox shares five things readers might be surprised to learn about the cable oddity-turned-media behemoth.-
ESPN was almost called the International Broadcasting Company (IBC) (Sports Illustrated wrote about us, and the phones would not stop!)
-
ESPN couldn’t afford an instant replay disc for its first telecast. (So, we hired the world’s fastest cartoonist. Ha!)
-
ESPN nearly blew a promise to air Monte Carlo Tennis when customs thought its video tapes were porn. (A C-Note fell on the floor and tapes were released)
-
Humphrey Bogart’s son Steve worked there. (He enjoyed the access to early game information for his hobby)
-
Two of ESPN’s founders were blown-out by investors before the network was on the air for a month. (Investor’s Darth Vader lowered the booms.)
The Early Days of ESPN is available for pre-order on Amazon.
