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This is SportsCenter
This is SportsCenter was a series of comical television commercials that debuted in 1995 and was run by ESPN to promote their SportsCenter sports news show, based on the show's opening tagline. The ads are presented in a deadpan, mockumentary style, lampooning various aspects of sports, and sports broadcasting. The New York office of advertising agency Wieden+Kennedy, of Portland, Oregon, wrote and produced the commercials until 2017, with ESPN taking production in-house since 2018. In 2022, ESPN's new creative partner, Arts & Letters, announced that it would revive the campaign in the beginning of 2023. On December 2, 2024, ESPN announced that it would be discontinuing the "This is SportsCenter" campaign after 30 years. The new campaign, entitled "My Life, My Team" will debut on ESPN's family of networks on December 30, 2024. A few of the ads are available for free on iTunes while many ads are available for viewing through the official ESPN YouTube channel.
Guest appearances by sports figures
A notable feature of the commercials is the seeming ubiquity of famous athletes on the ESPN campus. Some are even depicted doing menial, everyday tasks, usually while wearing their game uniforms. Athletes often have their idiosyncrasies parodied—for example, gymnast Kerri Strug being carried around ESPN headquarters because of her famous ankle injury.
List of This is SportsCenter spots
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Sports practices
Many commercials in the series have derived their humor from parodying conventional professional sports practices, by applying them to working for SportsCenter:
Sports mascots
Sports mascots and cheerleaders are usually present in most ads, implying they work behind the scenes at ESPN. They are often seen casually milling around in the background, but occasionally they take on an active role:
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