ESPN employees were "surprised" by John Skipper's resignation yesterday as the network's president, as there had been "no public hints that change was afoot," according to a front-page piece by Rick Maese of the WASHINGTON POST. Skipper last week "appeared at a conference in New York, discussing the network’s future and detailing some of the plans for ESPN Plus" (WASHINGTON POST, 12/19). Author James Andrew Miller reported nobody knew of Skipper's plans prior to Friday night, with "99.9% not knowing until" yesterday morning (TWITTER.com, 12/18). ESPN's Trey Wingo said, "We all were sort of taken aback by the announcement yesterday. We had that big talent meeting a few days ago and John was leading the charge, so it took us all by surprise” ("Golic & Wingo," ESPN Radio, 12/19). In N.Y., Kevin Draper notes Skipper yesterday "placed calls to his top executives informing them directly of the announcement, while ESPN communications employees placed calls to the sports leagues to let them know what was coming." Top execs and personalities at ESPN were "shocked at Skipper's resignation, expressing their appreciation for the support he gave their careers" (N.Y. TIMES, 12/19).
THE LEGACY LEFT BEHIND: SI.com's Richard Deitsch wrote people "cannot overstate the shock this will be to the ESPN ecosystem." Skipper particularly pushed ESPN to become "more diverse on air and online when it came to both gender and race." The "promotions of Doris Burke, Jessica Mendoza, Beth Mowins, Sam Ponder and Jemele Hill (as an opinionist) into positions traditionally held by men happened as a direct result of Skipper’s initiatives." The same can be said about the "founding of The Undefeated, a website at the nexus of race and sports." Skipper was a "major believer in ESPN’s journalism and the company would not have expanded 'Outside The Lines' or funded its enterprise reporting without him" (SI.com, 12/18). SI.com's Jack Dickey noted Skipper has "considerable respect and loyalty from those both inside and outside the company and has received little in the way of blame" for the recent issues facing the net. That comes as a "testament to the many initiatives, careers and voices he has championed." He made ESPN "gobs of cash ... but he also made the network smarter and sharper." Skipper "championed soccer and the NBA, realizing that ESPN, armed with its many affiliates and platforms, could get more out of broadcast rights than any of its competitors could." He "took chances" on Bill Simmons and Grantland, Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight site, The Undefeated and "30 for 30." He also sent a "great deal of cash journalists’ way in an era when most every other outlet was scaling back." However, he "takes the blame for fiascos from ESPN Mobile to Hill’s suspension to the one-episode run of Barstool Van Talk" and "leaves the company in a precarious spot" (SI.com, 12/18).
PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE? RECODE's Peter Kafka wrote during Skipper’s five-year run, ESPN "laid out billions of dollars for sports rights for leagues like the NBA, in an effort to solidify its status as the dominant sports network. Those deals did "give ESPN nearly full control of sports TV." But it also "left the network exposed as cord-cutting and cord-nevering eroded its subscriber base, and the revenue that base produced through affiliate fees and advertising." That "hasn’t been enough to shore up long-term trends working against ESPN and TV in general." Additionally, the erosion has been "substantial enough that ESPN had begun to re-think its lets-buy-all-the-sports-all-the-time strategy" (RECODE.net, 12/18).
