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When Rich Eisen anchored SportsCenter for the first time in 22 years last August, ESPN brought back the show\u2019s old-school graphics and music. The broadcast drew 708,000 viewers, 67% above SportsCenter\u2019s average in that 11 p.m. ET slot, ESPN told Front Office Sports at the time.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The reaction online showed how much fans had missed it. Eisen told Fortune in a recent interview he came across a video of a young woman recording herself as the familiar open played. She was crying.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a simpler time,\u201d Eisen said. \u201cPeople kind of wish it was like that again.\u201d<\/p>\n
That moment validated an idea Eisen had brought to ESPN when he returned: a nostalgia video podcast. This Was SportsCenter: Stories from the Set is a video podcast in which he reunites with former colleagues, with full access to ESPN\u2019s video archive. The first season debuted in June on Disney+ and the ESPN app and featured Dan Patrick, Chris Berman, Mike Greenberg, Linda Cohn, Chris Fowler, and Craig Kilborn.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A second season with six new interviews is slated for 2027, Eisen said, adding he\u2019s already lined up \u201csome pretty interesting commitments.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s kind of like a career scrapbook for everyone,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a fitting project for someone who helped define that era.<\/p>\n
From SportsCenter star to CEO<\/p>\n
Eisen, 57, worked for ESPN from 1996 to 2003, mostly anchoring SportsCenter during the show\u2019s cultural peak. He and co-anchor Stuart Scott became a popular anchor team in the late 1990s, even landing roles together in the 2000 Disney comedy The Kid. In its 2015 obituary for Scott, ESPN noted that the pair\u2019s late-night SportsCenter became next-day water-cooler talk, thanks to their chemistry and the show\u2019s repeated airings.<\/p>\n
Because ESPN re-aired his late-night broadcast several times the next morning, his SportsCenter show reached more than 100 million homes, he told Fortune in 2024. Kids watched him before school, and many of them now have teenagers of their own. Eisen said he \u201cliterally put\u201d that generation \u201con a school bus with Stuart Scott in the mornings.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 2003, Eisen left ESPN to become NFL Network\u2019s first on-air hire. More than two decades later, he\u2019s still there, hosting NFL GameDay Morning and anchoring the network\u2019s draft and Super Bowl coverage. In 2014, while still at NFL Network, he also launched The Rich Eisen Show, a three-hour daily mix of sports and pop culture that aired on DirecTV\u2019s Audience Network.<\/p>\n
Then, in December 2019, DirecTV\u2019s Audience Network was shutting down, and the show was about to lose its home. As Fortune previously reported, Eisen got the news two days before Christmas, along with the chance to take the show over himself. Overnight, the host became the owner. At the time, he said, it was \u201cquite daunting.\u201d<\/p>\n
But as the business found new homes, eventually on Peacock and then Roku, it grew. Eisen hired a CFO and more staff, and he put the company\u2019s revenue toward creating his own control room.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Through it all, he said, he\u2019s stuck to one principle: \u201cCreating an a\u2013hole-free environment, because this life is too short and this business is too small.\u201d<\/p>\n
This December marks seven years since Eisen took over the show, meaning he\u2019s now owned it longer than he spent as its contracted host under DirecTV. And last year, the show landed its biggest home yet: Eisen reunited with ESPN in a licensing deal that brought it to Disney+, ESPN\u2019s streaming platforms, and ESPN Radio. It also airs on SiriusXM and is released as a podcast, while his team cuts full interviews for YouTube and clips for Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we do every day is we meet the fans and the listeners or the viewers where they want to be met,\u201d Eisen said. He didn\u2019t share audience figures, but said viewership and listenership have \u201cexponentially exploded\u201d since the move.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no platform quite like ESPN\u2019s,\u201d Eisen said. \u201cThere just isn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n
A family business<\/p>\n
Eisen\u2019s production company also makes Women\u2019s Sports Now, a weekly show his wife, Suzy Shuster, created. She executive produces it and co-hosts alongside Renee Montgomery, Sarah Tiana, and Colleen Wolfe. It launched on the Roku Channel in 2025 and moved to ESPN this spring. Part of the inspiration was the couple\u2019s daughter, Taylor, a basketball player.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe point of this is women talking about women\u2019s sports,\u201d Eisen said, adding that season three is expected next year. Meanwhile, The Rich Eisen Show celebrated its 12th anniversary earlier this month.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s weighing more podcasts and possibly a celebrity-driven show, ideas he said are all on the table because \u201canything\u2019s possible.\u201d For now, he said, it\u2019s \u201cpretty amazing in this contracting world that this show keeps expanding.\u201d<\/p>\n
#Rich #Eisen #SportsCenter #owning #show #hes #ESPN #betting #nostalgia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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