ESPN is digging into its past in a bid to highlight its future.

The Disney-backed sports giant will bring fans the earliest era and also hint at what is about to happen on Thursday night during ABC’s first game aired in the NBA finals. The ESPN promotion will show some videos of the first minute on the wired network when it debuted in 1979. But by the end of Vignette, ESPN will highlight its ability to interact with sports fans through mobile devices, and it will use "Sports" with the new slogan "Sports Forever: "Forever".

All this is with ESPN restarting, the kickoff of a new $29.99 streaming service designed to give subscribers access to everything they offer on a single platform. The new service, called ESPN, is known as ESPN like the flagship linear network, will surface before the next game cycle of the NFL, with Disney's goal being to convince customers to bundle it with other broadband products like Disney+ and Hulu.

In the months leading up to the launch, the company "wanted to make sure ESPN is the head in the head," said Jo Fox, senior vice president of marketing for sports media marketing, in an interview. “We are showing the enthusiasm of our lifelong fans, but ESPN has played a role in connecting fans through technology. Most importantly, our mission is to serve sports fans anywhere, anywhere, and we have no rest right now.”

The new service is crucial to the fate of ESPN and its owners Disney and Hurst, who are emerging with subscribers from traditional cables to on-demand streaming. According to Kagan, S&P global market intelligence research unit, ESPN and ESPN2 are expected to have 61.4 million subscribers by the end of 2025, and may see those numbers drop to 57.9 million and 57.8 million respectively.

Nostalgia seems like a strange way to evoke the future, but ESPN executives believe the network’s long history makes it credible that others lack. “When you say, ‘Sports forever,’ words are words, right?” said Sinan Dagli, executive creative director of BSSP, the agency helped ESPN create promotions. “We have evidence.”

Some Disney competitors are also focusing on streaming sports fans this fall. Fox Corp. aims to launch a new standalone streaming Fox One, which will provide content from its linear portfolio to consumers who do not subscribe to cable or satellite services. The offer will include NFL and MLB games for Fox Sports.

Fox said ESPN's goal is beyond its immediate fan base. The goal is to get a group of about 60 million consumers to disagree with traditional TV packages to consider the new ESPN streaming venue, she said.

The location is the original footage of "SportsCenter" anchor Lee Leonard, opening the first play of the long-running show. "If you're a fan... what you'll see in the next few minutes, hours and days that follow may convince you to go to sports paradise." For decades, ESPN's audiences will soon have highlights, from classic game moments to sports player Stuart Scott saying "Booyah!" announcer Mike Breen shouted "Explosion!" ESPN personality includes Adam Schefter, Pat McAfee, Malika Andrews and Dick Vitale making cameo appearances.

At the closing ceremony on the scene, viewers saw fans get alerts from ESPN's mobile app, which sounds like the famous "da-da-da-da-da-da" audio prompt, part of the "SportsCenter."

ESPN plans to run vignettes on many Disney media, focusing on digital places and outdoor places.

"Forever Movement" may not last that long - who can say? - But there is certainly a desire to keep using it. "We don't think it's a kind of attraction," Fox said. "We like it because it's fun, but it's obviously very relevant. It also has a lot of different ways to activate it. So we're certainly thinking about how to do that and keep going."