ESPN plans more NBA, NFL alt casts as it looks for more ways to innovate sports viewing

At the ESPN Edge Innovation Conference in New York last week, Disney unveiled a holiday surprise.

Dunk the Halls, a holiday-themed animated NBA game alt cast that first premiered last year , will be returning this year on Christmas Day. Last year’s alt cast, which featured a game between the New York Knicks and the San Antonio Spurs, included characters like Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse; both characters will also return for this year’s alt cast, and Lilo & Stitch’s Stitch will appear for the first time in a matchup between the New York Knicks and the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Dunk the Halls is just one ESPN event that was touched on at the conference, where the sports network’s executives, along with representatives from Meta, Accenture, Microsoft, and sports content automation platform WSC Sports, discussed their efforts to innovate sports viewing using emerging technological capabilities.

A monstrously fun game: It’s not just the NBA that’s getting the alt cast treatment. ESPN is hosting a Funday Football alt cast for a Philadelphia Eagles vs. Los Angeles Chargers game on December 8 that will feature characters from the film Monsters, Inc. like Mike Wazowski.

The alt cast marks the third consecutive season that ESPN, Disney+, and the NFL have teamed up around a Funday Football alt cast.

The more, the merrier: ESPN is employing an aggressive marketing campaign that aims to bring sports fans and the sports-curious into the fold for its new DTC streaming offering, also called ESPN, which rolled out in August, Jo Fox, the company’s marketing SVP, said onstage. That has meant having a presence in diverse locations, including Walmart, TikTok, and Snapchat. Fox expects ESPN and ABC’s simulcast of the 2027 Super Bowl to drive further visibility among viewers.

Look ahead: When it comes to future technological innovation in sports, AI agents are going to usher in important changes to the space, Simon Crownshaw, worldwide strategy director, media and entertainment at Microsoft, said onstage.

“Those agents are coming,” he said. “The challenge for everybody in this room is going to be, ‘How do I make sure my data and my API is ready to get access to that?’ Because I’m going to do a lot more off-content discovery and off-platform discovery.”

ESPN is also leaning into VR, with the goal of making sports experiences available to consumers on various new devices that roll out in the space, Sonia Doshi, VP of strategic operations, design, and production for the Office of Technology Enablement at the Walt Disney Company, said onstage. It’s already working with partners like Meta, which manufactures Meta Quest VR headsets, on the endeavor.

“That animated telecast is such a great example of where worlds are colliding,” Doshi said. “This type of technology allows for that, for you to completely reimagine what you could do with your story, your IP, or your league in a totally different way.”