Amidst various investigations into the data leak and “insider trading” controversy surrounding DraftKings and FanDuel, and the entire daily fantasy industry facing significant questions and the prospect of regulation, someone at ESPN chose quite the headline and ad placement combination on the espn.com fantasy front page Friday morning. From Dustin Gouker of Legal Sports Report:
Originally thought this was Photoshopped. But it's 100% real. Just wow. http://t.co/cnnIxmmSh0 Photo from 10:46 ET pic.twitter.com/if681zCj8E
— Legal Sports Report (@LSPReport) October 9, 2015
In ESPN’s defense, “Insider Trading” is apparently a segment they’ve been running for some time this year. The full articles are exclusive to ESPN Insider and feature the embedded NFL Nation reporters from all 32 teams talking about stories with fantasy implications. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that as a segment title, but it does seem odd when placed next to a whole bunch of daily fantasy ads.
Speaking of daily fantasy ads, though? Remember earlier this week when ESPN was removing all daily fantasy-sponsored segments from their programming, and when DraftKings said they were suspending their advertising on ESPN? Well, the latter never really seemed to happen, according to Anthony Crupi of Advertising Age:
The agita re DraftKings supposedly pulling its ads from ESPN is a lot of noise. They've already aired 5 on ESPN this afternoon + 9 on ESPNU…
— Anthony Crupi (@crupicrupicrupi) October 7, 2015
Yesterday, after DraftKings reportedly yanked its spots from ESPN, they aired 4 national ads on ESPN, 11 on ESPNU, 2 on ESPN2 & 1 on ESPNews
— Anthony Crupi (@crupicrupicrupi) October 7, 2015
So 32 national DraftKings spots on ESPN and its sister networks after they "pulled" their ads. This shit isn't that hard to verify, FFS.
— Anthony Crupi (@crupicrupicrupi) October 7, 2015
And now it seems the sponsored segments are back too. Or, at the very least, banner advertising during ESPN programming:
Not sure how long they have been back. But they are back. pic.twitter.com/fdlqSVHd4M
— Dustin Gouker (@DustinGouker) October 9, 2015
ESPN’s far from the only network still showing daily fantasy ads, as the MLB playoffs on TBS, FS1 and MLB Network have been overrun with a constant stream of FanDuel ads. (It’s almost like Turner and Fox have equity in these companies!) So, despite all the investigations and controversies, the waves of ads and sponsorships seem likely to continue. FanDuel and DraftKings are probably hoping their ads aren’t placed next to “Insider Trading” segments in the future, though…
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About Andrew Bucholtz
Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.