NBC Sports will broadcast MotoGP races on its networks NBC and NBCSN in the United States in 2020, according to a report by Adam Stern, a staff writer for SportsBusiness Daily and SportsBusiness Journal.
You can read the original report here.
Roadracingworld.com has reached out to Dorna and NBC for comment, but as of post time we have not received a response.
If true, NBC will replace beIN Sports, which has held the rights to broadcast MotoGP and World Superbike races in the United States, Canada, and the Caribbean since 2016.
beIN Sports also previously held the rights to broadcast MotoAmerica races in the U.S., but after beIN Sports lost its deal with AT&T U-verse/DIRECTV and Comcast/Xfinity in 2018, MotoAmerica chose to take its television production in-house in 2019, do new broadcast deals with Fox Sports 2 (FS2) and NBC Sports, and offer its own live streaming service MotoAmericaLive+.
MotoAmerica recently announced that its 2019 TV viewership was up 134% over 2018 when the series was on beIN Sports.
NBC currently broadcasts American Flat Track, IMSA, IndyCar, MotoAmerica, NASCAR, and Supercross.
According to Stern’s report, plans call for MotoGP races to be delivered via a mixture of live and tape-delayed broadcasts and via live streaming over a new OTT (over-the-top) service call MotoGP Video Pass, which will also show Moto2 and Moto3 races.
The report does not mention any broadcast plans for the FIM World Superbike Championship, which Dorna also holds the rights to.
