It’s Black Wednesday at ESPN.
While the total carnage from the ESPN layoffs is estimated to be about 100 jobs lost in total, the effects of these cuts loom much larger. That’s because the positions being eliminated aren’t those of obscure, but extremely vital behind-the-scenes people. It’s the faces that we all know very well.
Many prominent on-air talent people were let go today, as were some of the network’s veteran reporters. Not just the cliche “insiders,” but the actual legitimate journalists.
Those included the noted NFL information broker Ed Werder; longtime columnist Johnette Howard; espnW staffer Jane McManus; college football and ESPN Radio analyst Danny Kannel; NHL reporters Scott Burnside, Pierre LeBrun and Joe McDonald and a mass of college sports reporters including C.L. Brown, Eamonn Brennan?, Jeremy Crabtree, Brett McMurphy, Max Olson, Dana O’Neil, Jesse Temple, Derek Tyson, and Austin Ward; MLB reporter Doug Padilla, ESPN Dallas Columnist Jean-Jacques Taylor, soccer reporter Mike Goodman and ESPNU anchor Brendan Fitzgerald, NFL analyst Trent Dilfer and Jayson Stark also tweeted they were being let go.
This list will only grow as the day goes on, but Deadspin is keeping a running list updated as more cuts are made public.
There’s a ton to unpack regarding today’s developments, and we covered that in the next post, which is an essay on what we’ve learned about the sports media industry through the ESPN layoffs today.
https://twitter.com/PaulMBanks/status/857299211477504000
Below are some of the the smarter, more well-informed Twitter postings about today’s sports media landscape shattering news
https://twitter.com/rockiesVSconnor/status/857274602392883201
honestly the "ESPN is losing audience because of liberal politics" argument is too stupid and too obviously false to engage with
— Albert Burneko (@AlbertBurneko) April 26, 2017
If you think people are being laid off at ESPN because they're too "liberal," and you're dancing on graves, you're a real schmuck.
— Mark Lazerus (@MarkLazerus) April 26, 2017
https://twitter.com/BigSportsWriter/status/857281814804795392
No, the ESPN layoffs didn’t come because “they got too political/liberal” so please drop that hackneyed misnomer. The “stick to sports!” crowd never yells that shopworn catch-phrase at Curt Schilling or Sage Steele.
Bristol is losing its audience and thus revenue due to cord cutting and an inferior product, and here a few Twitter users who understand that.
https://twitter.com/Kyle_Feldscher/status/857279850322812928
ESPN is basically doing with sports what MTV did when it stopped giving a shit about music
— Bob Zuppke (@BobZuppke) April 26, 2017
So, in review:
ESPN fires their #NHL staff as the 2nd round of playoffs begin
ESPN fires Ed Werder 36 hours before the #NFLDraft— Tab Bamford (@The1Tab) April 26, 2017
https://twitter.com/barry/status/857223138043723776
Where does the sports media industry go from here? As Principal Skinner said at Diorama-rama when he approached Ralph Wiggum’s entry….”now we’re into the dregs.”
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network. and News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times and NBC Chicago.com, contributes to Chicago Tribune.com, Bold, WGN CLTV and KOZN.
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