Fans of ESPN’s “Monday Night Football” might get something next week they won’t be expecting — a tribute to hockey.
The Disney-backed sports-media giant expects to spend part of its next halftime show treating viewers to a concert as well as a surprise visit from someone who is emblematic of the icy pastime, says Mark Gross, senior vice president of production and remote events, in an interview. He declined to name the person likely to appear. The weekly football showcase “exposes a large audience to the NFL and a larger audience” to a new NHL schedule slated to start the very next night, says the executive.
“We haven’t had hockey in close to 20 years,” he adds. “When you lose a property and then you get it back? That doesn’t happen every day.”
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