Posted on 04/26/2017 8:20:04 AM PDT by mandaladon
ESPN will cut more than 100 employees today, Yahoo Finance has learned.
That number is much bigger than the 40-50 that was initially reported. ESPN aims to notify all of the people today, if it can do so.
It has been widely reported for weeks that big cuts are coming to ESPN—so widely reported, and dissected, and gossiped about, in fact, that ESPN moved up its schedule and is notifying people earlier than it originally planned.
The 100 people getting cut are all “on-air talent,” a label ESPN uses for TV personalities, radio hosts, and writers who regularly appear on TV and radio. (ESPN says it has 1,000 such people, prior to these cuts.)
In addition to those 100, a “limited number of other positions will also be affected,” according to a note sent to all employees on Wednesday morning from ESPN president John Skipper.
A source tells Yahoo Finance the number of non-talent getting cut is indeed a “very limited” number, but nonetheless, the number is on top of the 100 on-air talents.
In his companywide memo, posted publicly, Skipper frames the cuts around a shifting content strategy. ESPN’s content strategy, he writes, “still needs to go further, faster… and as always, must be efficient and nimble. Dynamic change demands an increased focus on versatility and value, and as a result, we have been engaged in the challenging process of determining the talent—anchors, analysts, reporters, writers and those who handle play-by-play—necessary to meet those demands. We will implement changes in our talent lineup this week.”
The company also posted a public statement on its content strategy to its press page. The statement says that ESPN’s “content is evolving,” and that, “given how fans’ habits are changing, our focus continues to be providing high-quality,
(Excerpt) Read more at finance.yahoo.com ...
Gays, lesbians and raging lefties will sail through.
Please cut Jessica Mendoza from the Sunday Night Baseball broadcast. Who needs two color commentators, especially one that is a former softball player?
If someone had some capital they could have a startup to compete with ESPN. Just stick to sports and they’re clean up.
Schadenfreude. Fradenscheude? Hossenfeffer?
I hope that doesn’t mean that their dumb show with two Americans and a Mexican blabbering about nothing doesn’t get rerun even more than it already is. That seems to show up on ESPN eventually every time I’m at the gym, no matter what time or what day I go.
Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch.
Deciding to inject politics into sports programming has its cost.
I am glad the cafeteria workers, security guards, custodians, maintenance people and other such workers of ESPN are not the ones taking the brunt of the job cuts.
Talk football, you numnuts!
looks like the radical leftist America bashing and vicious attacks on my God given rights aren’t working. Maybe they should try something else. Like sports or something. People like to hear about sports.
No worry they can work for NPR’s Sports Division.
will the mullet guy get cut?
Jessica Mendoza seems like a nice young woman who has worked very hard to develop as a broadcaster. But she is way out of her element on Sunday Night Baseball. In the name of political correctness her bosses have put her in a no-win situation.
100 on-air personalities? That is one for every 1.68 hours on air in a week.
I watched a few minutes of a pre-draft show they had on last night. They had the their reporters, who cover each NFL team, make their team’s pick in a mock draft. In retrospect, it was a way for ESPN to bring all these reporters into Bristol to fire them!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.