Submitted by: kirkland on Tuesday January 18th, 2005 at 02:31 AM EST

EA today has announced that they have signed a 15 year exclusive deal with ESPN to publish their games for consoles and PC. SEGA, who currently publishes ESPN sports games will have to find a new strategy in 2006 when EA takes over.

Just a few weeks ago EA announced they signed an exclusive deal with the NFL and Players Inc to publish licensed NFL games for the next 5 years. While Sega and others have given EA healthy competition in the past, this will be coming to a sudden end.

While it is certainly possible for Sega to publish unlicensed sports games, the fans will no doubt choose to play as their favorite teams and players, something they can only do with an EA game come next year.