• by Wayne Friedman , July 12, 2022

Disney Advertising has signed on seven official sponsors and 20 advertisers overall for this year’s "The ESPYS" sports award show airing on ABC.

Capital One will serve as the presenting sponsor of the show -- now in its 12th year in that role -- for all ESPYS linear TV programming.

First time sponsors include Champion and Google, as well as returning sponsor Gatorade, which will receive recognition for their association with ESPN’s Fifty/50 content initiative, which commemorates the 50th anniversary of the passage of Title IX, a civil rights law that prohibited discrimination in educational institutions and gave women equal opportunities in sports.

Gatorade will also sponsor the Gatorade Athlete of the Year awards, which recognize the nation’s high-school athletes.

Other returning sponsors include Expedia, MassMutual and MolsonCoors.

Expedia will sponsor the Best Breakthrough Athlete award, and ESPYS Countdown and ESPN’s Digital Live Show from the red carpet.

MassMutual will sponsor the Pat Tillman Award for Service. Molson Coors’ Simply Spiked Lemonade will sponsor the ESPY for Best Men’s Athlete and the official Post Party.

A year ago, “The 2021 ESPYS” brought in an estimates $1.6 million in national TV advertising, according to iSpot.tv.

Major advertisers that year included Dove Men+Care, Blue Moon, MassMutual, Hotels.com, Gatorade, Pizza Hut, Subway, T-Mobile, Capital One, and Wheels Up.

“The 2021 ESPYS” on ABC averaged 1.2 million Nielsen-measured viewers. “The ESPYS” nomination show that year on ESPN averaged 234,000 viewers,

The awards -- closely associated with Disney sports cable network ESPN, which had aired the event for many years --- will air live on ABC, July 20. ESPN will air a nomination and preview show on July 19.

The ESPYS stands for Excellence in Sports Performance Yearly Award.