Good Morning Toronto Maple Leafs fans and people who enjoy creepy pictures of Mickey Mouse in the Stanley Cup.
The news we’ve ben expecting officially came out yesterday: The NHL and Disney have inked a huge seven year deal to give EXPN and ESPN+ broadcasting rights for the next seven years at $400 million per season.
NBC Sports Network has announced it’s shutting down and they were the national broadcaster for the NHL in the United States, so moving back to ESPN was a natural move. This gives them a bigger reach in the US as ESPN is in almost every household where NBCSN was still a fringe network, even after the third rebranding from Outdoor Life to VS to NBCSN.