ESPNChicago.com Launches

By Benjy Lipsman in News on Apr 13, 2009 7:30PM

Since its announcement in February, Chicago sports fans have been awaiting today's launch of ESPNChicago -- the sports network's first city-specific website. Why start with Chicago? While it made sense for HuffingtonPost to choose the Second City as its first local site, given the city's steep political history and well-known shenanigans, Chicago is perhaps not quite so obvious a choice for ESPN. Sure, we may think we're the best sports city in the land -- what other city's fans will sit through a blizzard on baseball's Opening Day or fill an arena to watch a 13-69 basketball team? But we can hear the objections from Boston and New York all the way here in the Middle West.

Scoop Jackson lays out the reasoning behind our gift from Bristol.

In our minds, this site, one dedicated to all of Chicagoland sports at every level, is long overdue. Because when it comes to the games we all play, watch and love, no one -- and I repeat no one -- on any corner of any block in any city any place in the world got swagger like us.

We couldn't agree more, especially when he lists some specifics like our two sides of town's hatred of each other when it comes to baseball, the six titles MJ, Scottie & Phil brought to town, our timeless obsession with the '85 Bears, etc. Oh, and, "Because we got Mike Ditka, fool." The new ESPNChicago.com features full coverage of all our local teams, from news and highlights of our teams to local columnists and blogs, to content from our local ESPN radio station. With baseball season under way, the Bulls and Hawks in the playoffs, and the NFL draft approaching, we couldn't think of a better time to add this new site to our rotation.