ESPN.com is the official website of

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...

. It is owned by ESPN Internet Ventures, a division of ESPN Inc.

History

Since launching in April 1995 as ESPNET.SportsZone.com (ESPNET SportsZone), the website has developed numerous sections including: Page 2, SportsNation,

ESPN3 ESPN3 (formerly ESPN360 and ESPN3.com) is an online streaming service owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between The Walt Disney Company (which operates the network, through its 80% controlling ownership interest) and Hearst Communication ...

, ESPN Motion, My ESPN, ESPN Sports Travel, ESPN Video Games, ESPN Insider, ESPN.com's Fanboard, ESPN Fantasy Sports, ESPNU.com, and ESPN Search. ESPN.com also has partnerships with MLB.com, NBA.com, NFL.com,

WNBA.com The Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) is an American professional basketball league. It is composed of twelve teams, all based in the United States. The league was founded on April 22, 1996, as the women's counterpart to the Nation ...

, MLSsoccer.com NHL.com,

Baseball America ''Baseball America'' is a sports enterprise that covers baseball at every level, including MLB, with a particular focus on up-and-coming players in the MiLB, college, high school, and international leagues. It is currently published in the form ...

Golf Digest ''Golf Digest'' is a monthly golf magazine published by Warner Bros. Discovery through its sports unit under its Warner Bros. Discovery Golf division. It is a generalist golf publication covering recreational golf and men's and women's compet ...

, Scouts Inc., Jayski.com, USGA.org, Sherdog.com, and Masters.org. It also has sections devoted to certain sports and leagues including: the

National Hockey League The National Hockey League (NHL; french: Ligue nationale de hockey—LNH, ) is a professional ice hockey sports league, league in North America comprising 32 teams—25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. It is considered to be the top ranke ...

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ma ...

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL) ...

National Basketball Association The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball sports league, league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues i ...

NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and h ...

Indy Racing League The IndyCar Series, currently known as the NTT IndyCar Series under sponsor (commercial), sponsorship, is the highest class of regional North American American open-wheel car racing, open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars in the United S ...

NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges and ...

Golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping ...

, Soccer,

Women's sports The participation of women and girls in sports, physical fitness and exercise, has been recorded to have existed throughout history. However, participation rates and activities vary in accordance with nation, era, geography, and stage of econ ...

(ESPNW),

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by st ...

, and eSports. Each section contains pages devoted to: scores, teams, schedules, standings, players, transactions, news wires, injures, and columnists pages.

Columnists

Some notable current and former ESPN.com and ESPNW.com columnists are Allison Glock, Jemele Hill, John Buccigross, Chris Mortensen,

John Clayton John Clayton may refer to: Arts and entertainment Writing * John Clayton (architect) (died 1861), English architect and writer * John Bell Clayton (c. 1907–1955), American writer * John Clayton (sportswriter) (1954–2022), American sportswriter ...

Adam Schefter Adam Schefter (born December 21, 1966) is an American sports writer and television analyst. After graduating from University of Michigan and Northwestern University with degrees in journalism, Schefter wrote for several newspapers, including ''T ...

, Andy Katz,

Bill Simmons William John Simmons III (born September 25, 1969) is an American sports analyst, author, podcaster, and former sports writer who is the founder and CEO of the sports and pop culture website '' The Ringer''. Simmons first gained attention wi ...

, Jayson Stark, Buster Olney, Paul Lukas, Gene Wojciechowski, Scoop Jackson, Pat Forde, Jim Caple, Michael Smith, and in the last stages of his journalism career, Hunter S. Thompson. The website was part of the

MSN MSN (meaning Microsoft Network) is a web portal and related collection of Internet services and apps for Windows and mobile devices, provided by Microsoft and launched on August 24, 1995, alongside the release of Windows 95. The Microsoft Net ...

portal from 2001 to 2004. ESPN launched a

Spanish language Spanish ( or , Castilian) is a Romance languages, Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from colloquial Latin spoken on the Iberian peninsula. Today, it is a world language, global language with more than 500 millio ...

website in 2000, ESPN Deportes.com. The content of some ESPN.com articles is argued to have been plagiarized.

ESPNW

ESPNW’s mission is to “inform and inspire female athletes and fans." The website covers a wide range of topics related to women in sports including women's soccer, martial arts, basketball, tennis, food and nutrition for athletes,

Title IX Title IX is the most commonly used name for the federal civil rights law in the United States that was enacted as part (Title IX) of the Education Amendments of 1972. It prohibits sex-based discrimination in any school or any other educa ...

legislation, LGBTQF inclusion, poetry, personal essays and music for athletes. Coverage of men’s sports is also included on the website. In 2019, personal essays by feminist self defense practitioner Rachel Piazza and gymnast Ellen Hagan were featured in their culture section. Since its inception ESPNW has included extensive coverage about women’s soccer. The 2011 Women’s World Cup was only the 6th women’s World Cup and the participation of the United States helped raise domestic awareness about the involvement for women in soccer, such as Mia Hamm. According to journalist Jack Bell, author of the ''New York Times'' article, 'Hamm Joining ESPNW for Women’s World Cup',“in the women’s game, the world is catching up to the United States; in the men’s game, the United States is always playing catch up.” ESPNW hired well regarded female athletes to commentate on their newly formed network. The involvement of such important figures as Mia Hamm helped grow ESPNW's reputation among sports fans. Hamm helped popularize the online network when she worked as a commentator during the 2011 World Cup for ESPNW as well as ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPN3.

Local sites

ESPN started local chapters of its website in response to the decline of local sports coverage available as newspapers continue to go out of business across the country.ESPN: The local leader in sports?
- Sports Business Daily, 14 September 2009 Each page covers local professional and college teams, hiring locally known writers, and in some cases making use of the city's

ESPN Radio ESPN Radio, which is alternately platform-agnostically branded as ESPN Audio, is an American sports radio network and extension of the ESPN television network. It was launched on January 1, 1992, under the original banner of "SportsRadio ESPN" ...

affiliate. In markets where the ABC Owned Television Stations owns a station, their sports coverage is incorporated with the corresponding ESPN local site. Some local sites have expanded into high school sports coverage.

Current

*ESPNBoston.com – with affiliate WEEI *ESPNChicago.com – with

WMVP WMVP (1000 AM broadcasting, AM) is a commercial Radio broadcasting, radio station licensed to Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, carrying a Sports radio, sports format. Owned by Good Karma Brands, the station serves the Chicago metropolitan area, Chicag ...

and

WLS-TV WLS-TV (channel 7) is a television station in Chicago, Illinois, United States, airing programming from the ABC network. Owned and operated by the network's ABC Owned Television Stations division, the station maintains studios on North Stat ...

*ESPNCleveland.com – with affiliates WKNR and WWGK *ESPNDallas.com *ESPNLosAngeles.com – with KSPN and KABC-TV *ESPNNewYork.com – with

WEPN-FM WEPN-FM (98.7 MHz) branded as ''ESPN New York'', is an all-sports radio station licensed to New York City. The station is owned by Emmis Communications and its operations are controlled by Good Karma Brands, under a local marketing agreeme ...

and

WABC-TV WABC-TV (channel 7) is a television station in New York City, serving as the flagship of the ABC network. Owned and operated by the network's ABC Owned Television Stations division, the station maintains studios in the Lincoln Square neigh ...

References

* {{Webby Awards, cat=Sports, year=2001, type=People's Voice Winner Internet properties established in 1993 ESPN media outlets