ESPN Cleaning House

[JayBee74]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

I know ESPN is going for the younger demo and the entertainment angle but they HAVE to keep some of the credible guys no? Next we're gonna hear that Bob Ley is gone. Almost anyone with an ounce of credibility is being shown the door.

I think Bob Ley is untouchable, even from this house cleaning.

[Blzer]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

First Chris Berman's wife, now Stephen A. Smith's mother passes away.

[ProfessaPackMan]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

More layoffs are coming real soon, per S.I

By Richard Deitsch November 09, 2017
ESPN will lay off more than 100 staffers after the Thanksgiving holidays, multiple sources tell Sports Illustrated. The layoffs, which were described by a person briefed on the plans, will hit positions across ESPN including front-facing talent on the television side, producers, executives, and digital and technology staffers. The SportsCenter franchise is expected to be hit hard—including on-air people—given the frequency of the show has lessened considerably on main network ESPN.

The network declined comment to SI on Thursday afternoon.

Though hiring has continued and the network remains one of the great destinations for jobs in sports media, ESPN has experienced significant layoffs over the last two years. In Oct. 2015 the company laid off roughly 300 employees, about 4-5% of its workforce—a particularly brutal act of gutting given the long tenures of many of those who were cut. Many of those employees helped build the foundation of ESPN and had given their professional life to the company.

Last April, ESPN eliminated around 100 journalists and on-air personalities. At that time the company said: “A necessary component of managing change involves constantly evaluating how we best utilize all of our resources, and that sometimes involves difficult decisions.”

ESPN continues to be impacted by the changing habits of consumers including cord-cutting and cord-nevers (those who have never purchased a cable subscription) as well as the rising costs of sports rights. The network has dropped in households from 100.13 million in 2011 to an estimated 87.5 million households.

Part of the reason ESPN will conduct the moves in late November/early December, two sources said, is to get employees an additional year in the stock vesting program.

Last month Michael McCarthy of Sporting News first noted a round of layoffs were coming to ESPN.

If you have endured layoffs at your place of employment, you know how extraordinary awful they are. Multiple ESPN employees in speaking with SI said the atmosphere in Bristol is tense, especially in the SportsCenter division. Asked to characterize how employees are feeling, one longtime on-air anchor: “Queasy”.

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[dickey1331]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

It seems ESPN doesn’t lay off the people in charge of why they are apparently struggling. Funny how that works.


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[kehlis]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

It seems ESPN doesn’t lay off the people in charge of why they are apparently struggling. Funny how that works.


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The story above literally says executives are among those expected to lose their jobs which was the case in the last round of layoffs as well if I remember correctly.

No story you read is going to focus on names you don't know though.

[SPTO]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

Richard Dietsch broke that story and wrote the piece. He does a weekly hit on Prime Time Sports here in Toronto and spoke a bit about it. Basically this is going to be the new normal for ESPN. As long as Disney sees ESPN as a drag on their bottom line then you're going to see these kind of 100+ people layoffs every 9-12 months. He went on to say that eventually all this turnover and attrition of news, behind the scenes and executive people is going to make their product suffer over time. The focus at ESPN seems to be shifting from sports coverage and news gathering to a focus on the sporting events with opinion surrounding it with sports news no longer being in any kind of focus.

I daresay that prestige presentations like 30 for 30 may become fewer and fewer over time and probably eliminated within 5 years.

[kehlis]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

I daresay that prestige presentations like 30 for 30 may become fewer and fewer over time and probably eliminated within 5 years.

I disagree, you're likely to see more of programming like that (as we already have).

The cost of shows like that when you compare it to the cost of paying personalities a salary for a year is far more cost effective.

My assumption is we'll see a lot less live shows (less overhead) and more program material.

[SPTO]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

I disagree, you're likely to see more of programming like that (as we already have).

The cost of shows like that when you compare it to the cost of paying personalities a salary for a year is far more cost effective.

My assumption is we'll see a lot less live shows (less overhead) and more program material.

You may be right. My assumption would be that kind of programming can be a bit expensive what with travel, interviews and getting the kind of people behind the scenes who can put out a good documentary. I totally agree we'll see more canned programming while the live shows become longer and done in blocks similar to how the news networks run their productions.

[p_rushing]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

Richard Dietsch broke that story and wrote the piece. He does a weekly hit on Prime Time Sports here in Toronto and spoke a bit about it. Basically this is going to be the new normal for ESPN. As long as Disney sees ESPN as a drag on their bottom line then you're going to see these kind of 100+ people layoffs every 9-12 months. He went on to say that eventually all this turnover and attrition of news, behind the scenes and executive people is going to make their product suffer over time. The focus at ESPN seems to be shifting from sports coverage and news gathering to a focus on the sporting events with opinion surrounding it with sports news no longer being in any kind of focus.

I daresay that prestige presentations like 30 for 30 may become fewer and fewer over time and probably eliminated within 5 years.

It's already shifted a long time ago. It's the reason they are failing. No one needs them, they don't show sports highlights any more, etc. If it wasn't for the live sports, I wouldn't want to pay for them as I would never watch 2-3 talking heads yelling at each just to create some debate on a topic.

They could easily fire the personalities and save a lot of money. Then invest in other tech to give highlights you don't see anywhere else. Create 360 views, VR views of games, etc.

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[jake44np]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

I am ready for the Right Time with B. Jones, to be the wrong time.
They need to replace him ASAP!
I heard he has the lowest ratings in National Sports Talk history.
I cannot listen to him for long than 5 minutes without turning his show off.

[Herky]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

I am ready for the Right Time with B. Jones, to be the wrong time.
They need to replace him ASAP!
I heard he has the lowest ratings in National Sports Talk history.
I cannot listen to him for long than 5 minutes without turning his show off.

I'm the same way. Cannot stand his show.

[LambertandHam]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

As long as Tony Reali doesn't get cut, only guy I can really tolerate.

[Blzer]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

As long as Tony Reali doesn't get cut, only guy I can really tolerate.

Maybe he'll just be demoted to PTI's "Stat Boy" again.

[jake44np]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

I'm the same way. Cannot stand his show.

There is a rumor that he is being replaced soon.
And that ESPN is going to say they are replacing him so he can work on a TV project.
But in reality they are replacing him because his ratings have dropped at an unreal pace.
I read yesterday he has been dropped by 39 national stations.
He honestly seems to know sports, but he usually refuses to talk about them.
Its like listening to CNN, if I wanted to listed to CNN I would turn it on.
I listen to ESPN radio to listen to sports talk.
And they way he deals with callers is just so arrogant and disrespectful.

[Speedy]

Re: ESPN Cleaning House

I've only seen/heard Bonami on Around the Horn and thought he was ok.

Clinton Yates, however...the guy seems less of a reporter and more of an instigator to me.