Please hold your jokes about a certain player’s ring being “Mickey Mouse.”
That’s because ESPN and the NBA are taking Disney’s animated ambassador to a new level on Christmas Day. Per Sports Business Journal, ESPN will produce an alternate “Dunk the Halls” telecast featuring Mickey and friends for the San Antonio Spurs-New York Knicks game at noon ET. The time slot is notably immediately following the Christmas Day Parade on ABC, where Disney characters are usually prominently featured.
The telecast will use Sony’s Hawk-Eye tracking technology to recreate the real-time game action. Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Donald and Daisy Duck, Goofy and Pluto will all be rendered into the action.
ESPN’s Drew Carter and Monica McNutt will serve as commentators for the game. Carter served as the play-by-play voice for ESPN’s Toy Story NFL altcast last year and will do the same for the Simpsons-themed game this year. The game will be broadcast across ESPN2, ESPN+, and Disney+.
“It is a big deal the first time doing something with the NBA, and we always want to try and be better than we were in the last one,” ESPN Senior Director of Animation, Graphics Innovation & Production Design Michael (Spike) Szykowny told SBJ.
The production will be a joint effort between ESPN and Beyond Sports, who also helped the network produce its Big City Greens NHL altcast, along with last year’s Toy Story game and the upcoming Simpsons-themed Monday Night Football telecast.
Beyond Sports CEO Sander Schouten spoke to the strategy regarding these alternative broadcasts. “If you get them before they turn 14, you have a chance to get them for life, for your sport, and that’s still a thing at hand right now that a lot of kids don’t engage with sports anymore, which for leagues, is obviously a future problem if you don’t do anything about it.”
Clearly, ESPN sees these types of broadcasts as valuable acquisition tools to convert young fans into lifelong viewers. Given the day and time, along with Disney’s iconic intellectual property, “Dunk the Halls” could prove the most successful animated altcast yet.
About Drew Lerner
Drew Lerner is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and an aspiring cable subscriber. He previously covered sports media for Sports Media Watch. Future beat writer for the Oasis reunion tour.