ESPN eliminates ESPN+ ‘Monday Night Football’ exclusive

ESPN is saying goodbye to its exclusive NFL game on ESPN+ this season.

On Tuesday, the network announced that the Week 7 game between the Houston Texans and Seattle Seahawks, which was initially scheduled as Game 2 of a Monday Night Football doubleheader at 10 p.m. ET on ESPN+, will now air on linear ESPN, as well as the network’s new direct-to-consumer streaming service. The game will remain in the same time slot and lead directly out of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers-Detroit Lions game scheduled for 7 p.m. ET that same night.

The move essentially expedites one of the terms of ESPN and the NFL’s recent deal, which will not go into effect until it receives regulatory approval, a process that can take a year or more. Under the terms of the agreement, ESPN forfeited its Monday Night Football doubleheaders, one of which typically features a game exclusive to ESPN+, but will receive the game inventory traditionally held by NFL Network.

Placing a game on ESPN+ greatly limits the number of viewers a typical NFL contest would receive. Last year, the Los Angeles Chargers and Arizona Cardinals were featured in the exclusive ESPN+ game during a window that largely overlapped with a Baltimore Ravens-Tampa Bay Buccaneers game on linear ESPN. The streaming exclusive drew a meager 1.8 million viewers, per Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk, whereas the Ravens-Bucs game topped 16 million viewers.

Of course, ESPN is also in the process of twilighting ESPN+ to focus on its soon-to-launch all-encompassing streaming product, even if the network doesn’t want to admit it. ESPN+ won’t be going away when the new streamer launches on August 21; it will be part of a “Select” plan that costs the same as a current ESPN+ subscription. However, that plan is more of a vehicle to fulfill prior contractual obligations than it is a distinct offering from ESPN, hence why the network decided to move its ESPN+ exclusive NFL game back onto its linear channel.