The political crack fights in Sao Paulo were told by André Hernan on the ESPN website last Tuesday. On Thursday, Bruno Andrade and Felipe Silva about details of Shaktar Donetsk’s onslaught by Gabriel Mec, the 17th anniversary of Grêmio.
Recent ESPN reinforcements, they carry the seal of journalists who have turned backstage into equity, distributing exclusive information on digital networks and punctual collaborations with traditional vehicles.
Soon, the findings of Hernan and Andrade will also be in the “Speech Source.” The program is one of the five new projects that symbolize ESPN offensive in the platform where the channel already has 7.2 million subscribers.
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Three of these initiatives had been in recent weeks. Now the list is completed with a game react made by talents of the house. Detail: The broadcasts will be accompanied by a QR code that takes direct to Disney+, offering the fan the chance to sign and watch the game live.
Named “Interactive Experience”, the event combines studio, real -time lineup and live statistics. The premiere was last Saturday, with the narration without images of Chelsea x Liverpool by the Premier League.
The front opened by ESPN in Digital/Youtube will have football as an anchor, recycle IPs already tested on TV, import formats from the American matrix, and will be anchored by a sober strategy.
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In Carlos Maluf’s words: “We are not being radical in the way you get into YouTube.”
Behind this caution is an unaffected conviction: YouTube can be showcase and funnel to reach new audiences, but it is not the center of the plan.
As the Disney sports head explained, it is a multiplatform performance that has been built for almost two years and will deliver “decent content without cannibalizing the main business.” Read: pay TV and Disney+.
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YouTube inherited the place of Da Era Ott, with the narrative of being “The New TV” and under the mantra “build and they will come.”
In the conversation with Maluf days before the debut of interactive transmission, however, it was very evident that ESPN will not be moved by the Fomo of Tudo Free on Youtube.
It is the safety of those who sport a $ 80 billion in sports rights acquired by the matrix in the last seven years.
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Sobriety as a strategy
ESPN does not embark on the formula of review and exaggerated humor (and often forced) that marked the newly debut of GE TV and earned accusations of copy of Cazétv. The line is different: austerity, without easy concessions.
“The way of delivering information will be different. Not on merit, but by the procedure.”
The killer phrase refers to the time when Maluf exercised law until the early 2000s, when ESPN carried “Brazil” in the name and the HD signal was just arriving in the country.
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Last month, Maluf received a trophy with the replica of one of Disney’s fairies in celebration of his 25th anniversary in the company. Its nearly three decades of experience, including rights negotiations, explain the weighted tone: he knows that it is necessary to talk to the young audience, but without delivering the “Filet Mignon” for free.
“We have to be careful with the free environment, where some sail with their best event. We are different.”
The mantra: protect what still gives money
At ESPN, there is a motto that acts as a defense mission: preserving the heritage of streaming and pay TV. And the matrix numbers recently revealed by reinforcing logic.
The channel still receives about $ 15 a month from each of the 61 million homes with cable or services such as Youtube TV, approximately $ 1 billion per month, even before selling ads. Remember that in 2011, just over three decades after its debut, ESPN reached 100 million subscribers.
This protection became even more urgent in a scenario in which sports rights fragmented. The spraying of sports media property was cited by Maluf at various times of the conversation. In the recent past it was not so.
The executive was appointed as a Disney Head of Sports in early 2019 on a reflection of the Disney and Fox fusion. ESPN Brasil then had a responsible manager.
“Basically, it was the junction of two linear channels, although ESPN was already highlighted in digital. This is not from now. But back, I negotiated with a cable network in Brazil only.”
To portray channel metamorphoses (ESPN International, ESPN HD, ESPN+, ESPN 360) Maluf uses the metaphor of the movie that never stops shooting. Only now, the room is crowded with “a lot of platform.”
Today, there are eight players in the country the same sports broadcast on Youtube, inside. Digital has become the new growth vector.
Recent projections by James Mortimer indicate that the rights market should grow between 4.5% and 6.2% per year by 2030, reaching US $ 114 billion. The problem: premium rights are and increasingly expensive.
And here is the central point of Maluf’s vision: who has the content, controls the property and decides where it will display.
“YouTube is not the end of everything,” he warns.
Criterion as a competitive advantage
Maluf argues that holding rights requires criteria. He rejects, for example, the strategy of displaying the same game on three distinct channels as Globo recently did, showing Brazil x Chile on open TV, SporTV and GE TV (YouTube). It is a practice that dilutes value.
In ESPN, the grid is defined two weeks in advance and follows selective principles: every right goes to Disney+; TV can give up secondary games, but never premium; and sprayed events on multiple channels do not enter.
The Laliga grid illustrates this logic. Over the weekend, Sevilla x Barcelona was exclusive to Disney+, while Real Madrid x Villarreal was divided between streaming and TV. And for the Youtube debut, Real Sociedad x Rayo Vallecano displayed with images.
Maluf insists, “You can’t have everything,” but controlling rights allows them to attack strategic niches.
Serie B became one of these niches and a “pleasant surprise.” Accumulated numbers until August show that the second division of the Brazilian has driven the audience in 2025: +18% range in ESPN channels, reaching 6.6 million homes with pay TV and 12.6 million people ( +12% vs. 2024). In the first half, the main channel grew 23%, reaching 5.5 million homes.
In the networks, the effect has multiplied: Series B generated 1 million interactions, 15 million views and 30 million impressions on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter/X and Tiktok.
The force (and the limit) of the digital
At Tiktok, ESPN still boasts the seal “Brazil” to differentiate itself from the matrix. There are 5.3 million followers in just two years, more than the 4.2 million Instagram and near YouTube. The growth, guarantees Maluf, was 100% organic. The strategy: five to six clippings of the same content distributed on different platforms.
Football dominates the feed and concentrates the audience: there are already more than 503,000 accumulated likes. On Instagram, there is more balance, with space for premium portfolio sports: NBA, NFL and tennis. Last Thursday, the feed brought Stephen Curry at the Golden State Warriors performance and a bid of Cerundolo Facundo in the Shanghai ATP.
This digital showcase, however, does not change the hierarchy of rights.
ESPN has a contract with NFL until 2033, this season begins the new deal with NBA for 11 years, renewed US Open for 12 seasons and secured Wimbledon by 2036. A billionaire package built with renegotiations made in the last seven years. And Maluf warns: they will not be on Youtube. At least for now.
The DTC is not a break!
ESPN is replicating in Brazil the same Disney’s global move: migrating its to digital without affecting the main pay -TV and streaming business.
In late August, the channel launched in the US its long -awaited direct consumer service. For $ 29.99 monthly, fans access all 12 linear channels, without cable, satellite or intermediates.
The new product does not seek to cannibalize the cable. On the contrary, all traditional subscribers continue with access released to the new application, maintaining the billionaire base of revenue. The DTC thus emerges as a complement and not immediate breakage.
And the numbers validate the bet: According to data from Antenna revealed at the Tuned In, ESPN and Fox One conference added 1 million entries in just ten days.
The data is for a simple reason: they are new customers, not migrations from other Disney plans. As highlighted by Rameez Tase, president of Antenna, it was proven that there is an audience outside the cable willing to sign when the product is attractive.
In Brazil, Maluf recalls that D2C is not new. And the context helps: cable TV shrinks at a rapid pace. In June, the number of hits fell 23% compared to 2024, according to Teleco.
The decline directly affects revenues: R $ 2.7 billion in June 2025 against R $ 3.3 billion in the same month of the previous year, minus R $ 600 million in a single quarter.
Fragmentation as a rule of the game
In the new order of transmissions, the spraying of rights is no longer exception.
As shown in the case of ESPN in Brazil, this reality accelerated two movements: direct consumer services (DTC) and open signal transmissions (OTA). The result is one, which tries to balance range, revenue and relevance of the brand.
In Mortimer’s view, the future is agnostic about platforms. The new logic of sports media is to find fans where they are, and not where you would like them.
In this reconfigured and crowded scenario, ESPN faces the loss of exclusives without drama. With the entrance of Globo in NFL, the channel was forced to dismantle its NFL super package and, from this season, alternates the NBA finals with the Prime Video.
For Maluf, ESPN preserves its prestige by offering the best of the catalog on all platforms, even though the traditional “world leader in sports” slogan has surrendered to “next era” to symbolize that it is embracing streaming not by choice but out of necessity.
And what is to come gains a pragmatic Darwinista tone in another language figure used by the shim of Disney executive.
“It’s the Darwin law lived: if you don’t adapt, you die. And understanding the negotiation formats of these rights is the main point.”
