With Taylor Twellman’s Departure, ESPN’s Drift From US Soccer Is Complete

Amid an already busy news week in American Soccer, on Friday Taylor Twellman announced on Twitter he would not be continuing in his long-time role as an ESPN host and analyst.

And in the scope of sport’s media landscape in the US, it’s an enormous if not necessarily a surprising revelation that represents how far ESPN has strayed from its one-time embrace of English speaking American soccer fans.

Twellman had been with ESPN for 13 years, which marks nearly half of the network’s 27-year relationship with Major League Soccer since MLS launched in 1996.

In the process, the all-time New England Revolution scoring leader grew into arguably the most important television analyst for American fans, serving as the face of righteous outrage when the US failed to qualify for the 2018 World Cup, one of the most visible advocates in the world for head-trauma prevention measures in the sport, and one of the few soccer broadcasting talents even casual soccer fans recognized instantly. (His obvious chemistry with SportsCenter anchor and fellow Maryland Terrapin Scott Van Pelt was valuable in the last regard.)

That talent even led him to roles that went beyond soccer at ESPN, and to a range of commercial endorsements (one of which paved the way for this Q&A he gave during the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic.)

Yet when ESPN chose not to renew its relations with the men’s and women’s US national teams earlier in 2022, and followed that with its official separation from MLS last month, it made Twellman’s departure a logical outcome. But you’ll be forgiven if you didn’t necessarily see it coming, as the events that set the table have come in a whirlwind fashion.

Less than three years ago, English-speaking American soccer viewers could expect ESPN to serve a majority or at least plurality of their rooting interests as the long-running home of the UEFA Champions League and one of two English-language partners for the US nation teams and MLS. The only major missing piece was the English Premier League, whose rights have been owned by NBC Universal since 2013.

But three huge changes were coming. The first arrived when CBS won UEFA Champions League rights beginning in the 2021-2022 competitive season. The second had been long coming but rarely talked about — that after 2022 the US men’s national team would play very few meaningful matches until the 2026 FIFA World Cup, since as a host it was guaranteed qualification.

The third and probably most important came when MLS completed a worldwide streaming deal with Apple TV. That meant even if ESPN continued as a national broadcaster of MLS, it would no longer hold those rights exclusively and no longer hold the out-of-market rights for non-national games through its ESPN+ streaming service. Ultimately ESPN balked and FOX became MLS’ only linear American TV partner for the next four seasons.

Before all this there were already rumblings that ESPN’s direction with respect to soccer was changing. But those developments shifted those changes into overdrive.

There are still broadcasters at ESPN who are plenty knowledgeable and capable of providing quality MLS and US national team analysts. Sebastian Salazar and Herculez Gomez should be praised for their work on their Futbol Americas project in particular. But going forward, none of them will carry the kind of clout in the short term that made casual sports fans view Twellman as a trustworthy source when he did a spot on SportsCenter or a morning ESPN talk show. That’s a major loss in terms of visibility.

Even while ESPN went without NHL rights for 16 years, longtime analyst Barry Melrose remained to give his views on the Stanley Cup Playoffs and other issues. That’s not to paint ESPN’s treatment of the NHL during that time as some shining example. And it’s not a perfect comparison, given that Twellman had grown into a more multi-faceted talent, serving at times as a studio host for non-soccer programming and also as a source of breaking news at times.

Going forward, ESPN remains involved in soccer in other parts of the world, but its American offerings are pretty sparse. The network will not serve as the home of any major international tournaments in the foreseeable future (its last was Euro 2020), and its highest profile offerings — Spain’s LaLiga, Germany’s Bundesliga and England’s FA Cup — are relegated mostly to the network’s streaming service.

Twellman is almost certain to land elsewhere, including potentially with Apple TV’s new MLS streaming service. But his departure drives home the reality that American soccer is entering a new era in which it can no longer call ESPN an ally. How important the breakdown of that relationship becomes remains to be seen.