The media or news industry has undergone a huge makeover over the past several years. From stiff collared news readers and reporters to blue and boring sets, to repetitive show formats all have seen an enormous amount of change. Along with the formats the complete physical aspect of shows has undergone makeovers. As older and more established media networks have revamped their look, there are a variety of brand new channels or news sites which have sprouted to meet the needs of the ceaseless requirement for news, whether it is in the field of current affairs, news, entertainment or physical activities such as sports.
Sports networks have emerged as one of the most important segments of the media industry. Sports enthusiasts coming from all over the world are looking for a daily feed of news and information in connection with the variety of sports which are being played around the world. Sports, too, as a physical exercise has evolved and has gained a wider reach due to the network of the media or news providers.
These days it is not just the conventional sports such as baseball, football, basketball, rugby etc that are popular but unconventional sports as action sports for instance surfing, skateboarding, rock and rock climbing, bungee jumping, sky diving etc have likewise found their fan base. There are a variety of people that practice and participate in these adrenalin pumping extreme sports, thus increasing its popularity and encouraging several media and news networks to come up and cover these events.
Fantasy sports, too, are some of the offshoots of this media change. Together with the internet transforming into a popular source of entertainment, physical sports have already been translated into virtual games in the form of fantasy sports. Now, people have the ability to play their favorite games which are modeled around the lines of professional sports including football, baseball, basketball, cricket etc. These games have global championships that are played mirroring the overall game pattern that the sport is founded on.
So like MLB baseball has 162 games being played in one season, fantasy baseball too has 162 games that will be played during the MLB season. Two media networks which are currently extremely popular in the fantasy games circuit are ESPN and Yahoo Sports. Both of these networks provide all the news, games statistics, scores and player as well as team standings. ESPN network even comes up with a fantasy sports newsletter that covers all the action from this sports world.
ESPN has additionally taken the initiative of getting X Games popular. X Games are series major action sports championships which are organized and broadcast by ESPN. These games began in 1995 and have gained its group of fans since.
Owing to the diversities in the games there are two championships held every year; one during summer and one during winter covering the summer and winter sports categories respectively. The participants vie for the gold, silver and bronze medals together with the prize money award. ESPN continues to be the live broadcaster of such games and can be considered as pioneers in this genre of sports broadcasting.