Posted on 05/03/2017 2:29:09 PM PDT by drewh
Last week, ESPN, often referred to as the Worldwide Leader in Sports, laid off around 100 employees. The cuts were painfully public and claimed the jobs of some of the top talent and most familiar faces at the network. At the heart of the latest downsizing, as with earlier layoffs, is math: The network has committed billions of dollars to broadcast live sports, and waves of cord-cutters now threaten the cash flow to pay those bills. But amid the hand-wringing over the cable giant’s business outlook, a subplot has begun to dominate the coverage: ESPN’S politics.
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. For several years now, Travis has been one of the loudest, most persistent antagonists of ESPN on the internet, haranguing the behemoth sports network in much the same way that right-wing disrupters have lobbied against the political media establishment. Among Travis’ biggest gripes: ESPN heaped laudatory coverage on Michael Sam, an openly gay football player, while firing Curt Schilling for a series of incendiary remarks. The network honored Caitlyn Jenner with its Arthur Ashe Courage Award after she came out as a trans woman, and then moved a company event away from a Donald Trump golf course.
And Travis is not alone. National Review, the Washington Examiner and, of course, Breitbart have all weighed in to accuse ESPN of partisanship.
By the end of last week, Deep Root, a media analytics firm that does work for Republicans, published a study that suggested that politics have affected ESPN’s audience. According to Deep Root, which matched voter files and set-top box data, ESPN’s viewers in Cincinnati were majority Republican in 2015; in 2016, they skewed Democratic.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
Bruce Jenner promoting indeed was the start of ESPN becoming a politics network. Bruce Jenner is a satanist POS corrupting our national morals and our children.
Imagine the profits they would have had if they kept Rush and ignored the left...
Too stupid to remain neutral.
I think it’s part of Disney. In any case, if I were one of the shareholders, I would be livid.
That was just one of many stupid libtard pc sjw obviously wrong positions they’ve taken.
A human male can simply choose another gender? Really ESPN?
And this human male was celebrated in favor of actual heroic athletes.
It’s group-think of one ideology... not the ideology of sports fans.
I hope espn sinks. To the bottom.
[ Did Too Much Caitlyn Jenner Doom ESPN? ]
I certainly hope so. It would be poetic.
I’m definitely tired of hearing about Bruce Jenner and his mental illness.
Is ESPN still on cable? I thought they had already gone defunct.
ESPN originally cut its teeth on unwatchable AWA pro wrestling, billiards, strong man contests, and other fourth tier sporting events. Maybe they will go back to their roots.
To much leftish, racial politics.
Really.
Someone said that you don't correct/cure gender identity issues with surgery.
Faggotry, leftist politics, BLM, Gun Control rants, Michael Sam celebrations, pink everything in the NFL... who knows what went wrong? Such a mystery.
These companies, in an attempt to appear hip, are embracing younger, fickle audiences who at the drop of a hat will abandon them for the next new thing. (Inevitably they make idiots of themselves, like Pepsi and Dove.)
Meanwhile, these companies openly disregard and disrespect their conservative base — viewers/consumers who are the ones most likely to remain loyal (and into sports).
Does anyone else see the irony here? A good marketer should understand his/her company’s core values and messages.
Although not into sports or ESPN, I heard about that Jenner travesty like everyone else. And it was then that I knew ESPN’s days were numbered.
Yeah, I don’t get it...
I was in a restaurant with my wife and children in Waco, TX and ESPN was on some of the large TV’s. Middle of the day and it was showing some story about some HS gays playing football, hugging, kissing... ESPN can go Chapter 7 for all I care.
What ESPN? Is that some gay sports show?
I don’t watch sports anymore but I thought the kneeling for the National Anthem had a bit to do with it, too?
He kicked off a few copy cats and America just said, "screw you" because the network never spoke patriotically against this weird stuff.
happened well before Jenner- the cheerleading for michael sam pointed the needle...
i was in a TV studio that final day of the draft with a retired black NFLer as the pick was made and all the after “celebration” by ESPN and he was dropping F-bombs on “now they’re gonna shove this sh@t down our throats!!”...
had someone taped it and posted it this person’s career would’ve been done...
Disney has a shareholders meeting next month...all the recent firings is the first step in ESPN’s presentation at the meeting in the hopes Disney does not sell them off...i’m told upper management cuts are next...
i have a very good friend formerly at the network who was on one of their highly rated NFL shows....he is as a-political as they get and never talks politics...he said to me, “they laid off a few black guys and a couple of women but if you were a white guy over the age of 35 you were dead in the water” in reference to the recent cuts...
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