Riot has announced on a recent blog post that they will be partnering with ESPN+ for the 2018 NA LCS Summer Split as well as all major international competitions. In the announcement, they called the move an “evolution” from their original deal with BAMTech. However, once looking at the details, the deal is vastly different than the one originally described. In late 2016, Riot announced their partnership with BAMTech and called it a “first-of-its-kind long-term commercialization partnership.” While that quote says little, Riot’s enthusiasm said lots. Of the original deal, Riot said this:

That was the original deal. Now that BAMTech has been bought out, the new deal sounds far less exciting in virtually every way. Riot promised a deal that has never been done before and wanted to push the boundaries of esports viewing. What fans got was a subscription service to ESPN that happened to include League of Legends. It should also be pointed out that LoL is still going to be available for viewing on Twitch, YouTube, and Lolesports. In reality, there isn’t anything this deal does for established fans. Twitch, unlike ESPN+, is free, so fans can simply tune in on their phone to watch the game. Plus, Twitch comes with a myriad of other things like chats, extensions, and trivia. If this is a step forward, it is a very small one.

Perhaps more importantly, Riot has a less than friendly history with ESPN. This might indicate that Disney’s purchasing of BAMTech wasn’t just coincidence, as it basically killed the original deal. Back in Riot’s infancy, ESPN wanted nothing to do with them. To say ESPN was cold to the idea of esports would be an understatement. In 2014, ESPN president John Skipper was asked his opinion of game like League of Legends and esports in general. His answer was fairly straight-forward.

What Skipper didn’t account for was that League of Legends would go on to be watched by more people than the finals for the MLB, the NBA, and the NHL combined. Esports also routinely sell out massive venues like the Staples center. The fans at such events also seem a little more excitable than those tuning in to watch Checkers.

Two years after Skipper’s announcement that esports didn’t matter, ESPN launched a vertical dedicated wholly to esports. This included coverage of all major tournaments, team scores, and news on players and teams. Despite ESPN’s new love for esports, sources said that Riot was no longer interested in having anything to do with the company.

Not even a month after ESPN launched their big esports push, Riot put to rest talks that they might be brokering a deal. It was Riot, this time, who were dismissive and abrupt. Their only statement in regards to a $500 million deal was, “The story is inaccurate – no active talks with ESPN at the moment.”

After that, the gloves came off. ESPN reported on several high profile stories that should never have been leaked. Immortals being kicked out of the NA LCS was something Riot was keeping intentionally under wraps. In fact, per the application process for the newly franchised League of Legends, all teams were under NDAs not to share a word about if they were denied or accepted into the League. ESPN found a way to break that story anyway. ESPN even managed to break the news of Dignitas’ denied application before coach SaintVicious knew. Needless to say, Riot wasn’t happy.

According to sources at Riot, it was a constant source of frustration for the esports division. ESPN was dictating when news was breaking, not Riot. All of that was last year though, with much of the news breaking in October during Worlds. Since the start of 2018, the relationship between the two companies has not gotten much better.

During the NA LCS Spring Split, ESPN once again got access to privileged information and announced – before Riot did – where the Spring Split finals would take place. ESPN made the announcement on February 4. Riot made the announcement one day later on February 5. It’s fair to say that since snubbing Riot all those years ago, ESPN has been playing pretty dirty. Gaining access to privileged information and announcing locations before the company can isn’t exactly a sign of a functional relationship between partners.

Perhaps in anticipation of another leak, Riot announced the location of the Summer finals well in advance of the date. The Spring Split finals were announced just two months before the finals would take place. The Summer Split announcement came five months in advance. This time, Riot wasn’t taking any chances of ESPN beating them to the punch.

Disney buying out BAMTech essentially killed the deal that Riot had and forced Riot to renegotiate. This move also just happened to come as ESPN was getting ready to launch their new mobile app – ESPN+. It all fits together very nicely, but also paints a picture that ESPN has been forcing themselves, rather roughly, into the esports world whether Riot wants them in or not.

While Riot sounds optimistic about the new deal, many voices in the community don’t think that Riot is celebrating anything. Travis Gafford went into extensive details regarding just how big the fallout of that deal is in terms of scope and finances. We could reiterate what he said, but he does a great job of it himself. The point is, the new deal pales in comparison to the old one with BAMTech. It is also fairly likely that Riot will not generate as much revenue from their newest deal.

The exact details of the deal – in terms of length, profits, etc. – are undisclosed at this time. The only real benefit of the deal is that it may draw in new fans. However, if we had to guess what sports fans think of esports, we have the president of ESPN’s own words to look at, and they don’t seem very inviting.