ESPN Layoffs

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Holy Man

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I saw a couple of articles yesterday about another round of layoffs at ESPN. Some big names and long tenured on air personalities.

Jalen Rose, Jordan Cornette, and LaPhonso Ellis are the college basketball names that stick out to me.

I really liked LaPhonso in the studio. I wonder if losing the B1G contract is part of the bloodletting. I thought they were done with it a couple years ago. Sports media starting to crumble.
 




Roland Brooks said:
Jalen Rose sucked. The ESPN NBA half time show is CACA 💩… Suzy Kolber is good. Van Gundy I thought was entertaining…
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Suzy must have been paid too much. Get an up and comer for half the price.
 


Phons was awesome in studio with Seth. I hope they bring back Jay will. I did see that rumor
 







GopherBlood666 said:
McShay mocked Leidner in the first round. Substance abuse makes all too much sense now.
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He talked about it on Rusillo's podcast a few months ago, that it was an initial mock and that he had barely seen Mitch play.
 





Steve Young was easily the most entertaining regular NFL guest on PTI's 5 Good Minutes. I will also miss Van Gindy, Everett, Ellis & Pollack.
 

Did like Pollack one GameDay.

With Pat McAfee now on GameDay along with money they just gave him assuming this is what cost Pollack his job.
 
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goldengophers said:
He talked about it on Rusillo's podcast a few months ago, that it was an initial mock and that he had barely seen Mitch play.
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Let’s say for instance my job is exclusively to produce mock drafts.

I’m not sure I publish something without looking.
Especially because if Mitch projected as a first rounder next year he probably projected as at least a 3rd rounder if he came out a year early.


This tells me that McShays mock drafting is less evaluation and more trying to make his mock fit the rumors he is hearing.
 

used to watch a ton of espn back in college and now i almost never have it on as i can gather the information i'm actually interested in far faster than watching an entire show. they're going to have to majorly shift their programming or the cuts are going to continue and it will continue to be these upper mid tier people who cost a ton of money relative to the product but don't "add" a ton in terms of creating drama (SAS who is a moron but he yells loudly so he creates buzz) or have their own personal following (Wilbon, Van Pelt)
 


Some guy said:
Let’s say for instance my job is exclusively to produce mock drafts.

I’m not sure I publish something without looking.
Especially because if Mitch projected as a first rounder next year he probably projected as at least a 3rd rounder if he came out a year early.


This tells me that McShays mock drafting is less evaluation and more trying to make his mock fit the rumors he is hearing.
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I certainly don't mock anyone in the first round without watching. If he missed on calling Mitch a 3rd round pick - meh, I get it. A first round pick? I'm with you, that's just absolutely lazy.
 

I get what ESPN is trying to do but I think they will miss the spot a bit. They essentially went all in on Pat McAfee and his crew is going to be on every single show in the next few years.

I like McAfee, but unfortunately, he is going to lose a lot of his shine now that he is PART of the machine. A certain portion of his appeal was because he wasn't part of it. If you look at the comments section of when he announced he was going to ESPN, it was flooded with people saying things like "I get why you did it, but unfortunately I can't follow you. It was a good run". For better or worse, ESPN pushed enough people away that they created a massive opportunity of an audience for McAfee. He was awesome and made the best of the opportunity but I don't think as many of those people will follow Pat as ESPN might think they will. In order to pay for Pat and justify that payday with declining ratings, they had to make some room.

So I get it, it's a gamble. I don't think it plays out the way that they want though. I think McAfee is going to immediately lose a chunk of loyalists and then the remaining McAfee fans are going to be hyper-critical in searching for changes and he's going to have a hard time holding on to them. IF this all happens while they keep Malika Andrews and cut Jalen Rose. . . woof.

I think ESPN's better move would have just been to lean into sports and away from politics as much as possible (like Pat did). I think I would have improved our brand internally rather than trying to buy that improvement with McAfee.
 

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This is from Fortune magazine. Neil Everett was on Dan Patrick and I got the feeling "half listening" he made the decision himself to make a career change with Dan Patrick as a role model that there is life beyond ESPN and he wanted to explore.

Bigger point, if these people have contracts and they are going to pay them anyway...why wouldn't they continue to have them work and talk negotiation about the future up until the expiration. I mean if the contracts run out in a couple months, okay, but if some of these had years to go?

McAfee for a huge amount of money seems risky at best to me. I watch McAfee on occasion because I watch on Youtube whenever I want and pick the topics I'm interested in. He has said he is keeping Youtube, so how will that benefit ESPN if people like me continue to watch on Youtube unless McAfee gave them the money rights but even then....I dunno if I'm doing the deal if I'm ESPN.
 
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60's Guy said:
Bigger point, if these people have contracts and they are going to pay them anyway...why wouldn't they continue to have them work and talk negotiation about the future up until the expiration. I mean if the contracts run out in a couple months, okay, but if some of these had years to go?
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At least in part, ESPN is banking on the fact that media people need to remain visible to remain relevant. I don't know McShay's contract status, but let's say that he's got two years left. His contract with ESPN almost certainly says he can't opine on the NFL, the NFL draft, college football, college football players, etc. anywhere except on ESPN or affiliated platforms. That means no TV, radio, podcasts, streaming services, social media, etc. If he wants to branch out into a new line of work, he can probably do that and still get paid by ESPN, but if he wants to work in sports media, he either needs to wait out the contract or negotiate a buyout with ESPN. There are a lot of people trying to fill roles in sports media and it's a sizeable risk that he will never get back in the public eye to the same level of prominence if he's absent that long.
 

60's Guy said:
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This is from Fortune magazine. Neil Everett was on Dan Patrick and I got the feeling "half listening" he made the decision himself to make a career change with Dan Patrick as a role model that there is life beyond ESPN and he wanted to explore.

Bigger point, if these people have contracts and they are going to pay them anyway...why wouldn't they continue to have them work and talk negotiation about the future up until the expiration. I mean if the contracts run out in a couple months, okay, but if some of these had years to go?

McAfee for a huge amount of money seems risky at best to me. I watch McAfee on occasion because I watch on Youtube whenever I want and pick the topics I'm interested in. He has said he is keeping Youtube, so how will that benefit ESPN if people like me continue to watch on Youtube unless McAfee gave them the money rights but even then....I dunno if I'm doing the deal if I'm ESPN.
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My understanding is that McAfee will be on ESPN's youtube channel. So I'm sure it's some portion of the deal/revenue split/etc.

That's actually the smartest part of the deal (IMO) if you're ESPN. There are a number of people who will continue to click on McAfee links and shorts, and portions of the show that might not even notice that he is ESPN now. Their goal should be for that to feel the exact same as it does right now. Then those McAfee clips will roll right into the connected ESPN shows (either automatically or through suggested).

McAfee is their attempt to put their finger on the algorithm to kick it to other McAfee content and other ESPN youtube clips. I think ESPN ONLY does this deal if McAfee keeps doing the youtube show as is.
 

goldengophers said:
He talked about it on Rusillo's podcast a few months ago, that it was an initial mock and that he had barely seen Mitch play.
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Aww jeez mcshay still taking heat for the Leidner thing. Well, it was ridiculous.
 


BTChamp said:
Wow. Big names on that list. I know this is the basketball forum, but gonna miss Pollack on Gameday.
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Me too. I like him. Can't stand McAfee. He comes off as the frat guy who's well out of college but still comes back to the fraternity on Saturdays and wants to drink and party with the current college kids.

I used to love Gameday when it was 2 hours long and just covered college football. Now it's 3 hours, we get "human interest" stories, and we're going to lose Corso* and McAfee will be more prominent? Probably won't even watch.

Footnote: I know Corso isn't on the list, but the dude's gonna have to give it up at some point, he's close to 90.
 

GopherTheJugular said:
Me too. I like him. Can't stand McAfee. He comes off as the frat guy who's well out of college but still comes back to the fraternity on Saturdays and wants to drink and party with the current college kids.

I used to love Gameday when it was 2 hours long and just covered college football. Now it's 3 hours, we get "human interest" stories, and we're going to lose Corso* and McAfee will be more prominent? Probably won't even watch.

Footnote: I know Corso isn't on the list, but the dude's gonna have to give it up at some point, he's close to 90.
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This is the biggest risk in my opinion. I like the Pat McAfee Show but I can definitely see your point of view on this. To me, it feels like a fun sort of "side dish" to more sports focused coverage.

It kind of reminds me of PA. I liked PA and Dubay back in the day (hey hey, those words end the same way). But I liked it because Dubay was pure sports and then PA brought a little levity. PA, by himself, is absolutely brutal. It's unlistenable for me.

I think McAfee all the time is going to get tough to watch. I don't know if it'll be any tougher than Stephen A. Smith yelling or Malika Andrews calling out basketball players, but we'll see.
 

GopherTheJugular said:
Me too. I like him. Can't stand McAfee. He comes off as the frat guy who's well out of college but still comes back to the fraternity on Saturdays and wants to drink and party with the current college kids.

I used to love Gameday when it was 2 hours long and just covered college football. Now it's 3 hours, we get "human interest" stories, and we're going to lose Corso* and McAfee will be more prominent? Probably won't even watch.

Footnote: I know Corso isn't on the list, but the dude's gonna have to give it up at some point, he's close to 90.
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You know, I would have never come up with that analogy, but it fits perfectly. That was funny.

On the rest, yes I agree. Desmond Howard and his laugh will bring me back though at least for a little bit, but that's about it. Corso is already starting to ease his way out so, that part will be gone soon which sucks.
 

Hmmmm….this is pretty much how I spend every Saturday home game.
 

GopherTheJugular said:
Me too. I like him. Can't stand McAfee. He comes off as the frat guy who's well out of college but still comes back to the fraternity on Saturdays and wants to drink and party with the current college kids.

I used to love Gameday when it was 2 hours long and just covered college football. Now it's 3 hours, we get "human interest" stories, and we're going to lose Corso* and McAfee will be more prominent? Probably won't even watch.

Footnote: I know Corso isn't on the list, but the dude's gonna have to give it up at some point, he's close to 90.
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Agree on MacAfee. I’m no prude, but when your show cannot exist without F bombs every 30 seconds I’m done.
 

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