As of December 2023[update], ESPN8 The Ocho is also offered as a FAST channel on ABC's website and app.[3]
Origins
The concept of ESPN8 originated as a fictional television channel in the 2004 film Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, in which it was a full-time channel showcasing obscure competitions that are "almost a sport" (its name being a comic exaggeration, since at the time there were only four linear ESPN channels—ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNEWS and ESPN Classic; the fifth, ESPNU, launched a year after the film). Its nickname "The Ocho" (Spanish for "eight") was a play on ESPN2's 1990s nickname "The Deuce."[4][1]
Starting August 8, 2017, ESPN paid homage to its lampooned portrayal in Dodgeball by airing a day-long "ESPN8: The Ocho" marathon on its college sports channel ESPNU as a way to fill airtime on the channel during the collegiate offseason. The 2017 airing was a success, prompting ESPN to repeat the block the next year, this time licensing the Dodgeball film from 20th Century Fox for inclusion in the block (ESPN's parent company would buy 20th Century Fox the next year); it made some other adjustments to the 2018 schedule, including heavier editing to shorten each sport's time slot, hoping to accommodate short attention spans.[2]
Continuation
Due to a lack of live sports programming during the COVID-19 pandemic, ESPN announced on March 22, 2020, that it would reprise the stunt earlier than scheduled on ESPN2.[5] It did it on May 2, 2020, on ESPN, and then August 8, 2020, on ESPN2 as well as the Big Screen in Fortnite Party Royale.[6] A collection of sports that were featured on ESPN8, as well as the ESPN8 broadcast on these said networks, were available on the ESPN app.
Beginning in 2022, the majority of "OCHO Day" programming are events broadcast live from two venues in Rock Hill, South Carolina – The Rock Hill Sports & Event Center and Manchester Meadows.[7][8] Rock Hill is a suburb of Charlotte, North Carolina, where ESPN has production facilities for ESPNU and the SEC Network.[9][10]
The event was held again on ESPN2 on August 3, 2023.[11][12] For 2024, to celebrate "ocho years of The Ocho," the block expanded to four days, with the Savannah Bananas as the tent-pole; all three games of the team's Louisville, Kentucky series were telecast live in prime time, including the second game on ESPN's flagship channel, the first time the ESPN8 brand has expanded there.[13]
The tongue-in-cheek inclusion of such sports on ESPN's schedule has led to increased exposure opportunities for those sports, which have performed well for ESPN. ESPN added a cornhole tournament airing in July 2018 outside the block, which it noted outdrew the WNBA All-Star Game, regular season Major League Baseball games and the final stage of the Tour de France among the key demographic of men age 18 to 49.[1] The inclusion of the Excel World Championships, an eSport that involves using spreadsheet programs in a competition to solve a series of problems, helped give the contest mainstream attention and credibility.[15]
ESPN8 appeared in the 2024 TV series Knuckles as the in-universe broadcaster of a bowling tournament, with commentators played by Rob Huebel and Paul Scheer.[16]
