Black Wednesday at ESPN

#1      

Peoria Illini

Peoria, IL
Lots of ESPN personalities are getting let go by ESPN in cost cutting measures. My twitter feed is getting peppered with tweets by people on the way out.

Dana O'Neill, Ed Werder... etc.
 
#3      
Dick Vitale is the Ted Baxter of ESPN.
 
#7      
If MLB Network doesn't pick up Stark 10 minutes ago, they're bigger idiots than I already think they are.

He might have a number of different suitors.

But lets be honest, the awesome columns he is so famous for with the trivia and the statistical oddities and all of that, that's kind of a form of media from a bygone era.
 
#8      
Others...

Jay Crawford, Trent Dilfer (right before the draft!), Danny Kanell, Pierre LeBrun (during the SC playoffs!) and Jim Bowden.

I derived a lot of unintended humor from Jim Bowden by imagining Theo Epstein getting his GMing strategy from reading Bowden's columns and then doing the exact opposite of Bowden's suggestions.
 
#9      
Can't believe Stark got the axe. I assume his salary is huge and they decided between him and Kurkjian? And imo, Russilo and Kennel are really the best thing ESPN had going and now...
 
#10      

Peoria Illini

Peoria, IL
I know he's no longer with ESPN, but with all these folks looking for work, how does Keith Olbermann still have a job? :confused:
 
#11      

kcib8130

Parts Unknown
Just further proving that ESPN has no concern in actually covering sports but creating reality-type talk shows to fill air spaces between east coast games. If we never have another game on there I would be totally fine with it.
 
#12      
He might have a number of different suitors.

But lets be honest, the awesome columns he is so famous for with the trivia and the statistical oddities and all of that, that's kind of a form of media from a bygone era.

He needs to sit down and write an actual book. His three published are all more compilations of newspaper columns. If he wrote something somewhere between Bill James' Historical Baseball Abstract and the baseball version of Bill Simmons' Book of Basketball, I'd buy it.
 
#14      

Illiniaaron

Geneseo, IL
Apparently they want to make a morning show with Mike Greenberg that is part sports, part news, part entertainment to compete with the Today show, GMA, etc. I can guarantee that there is a 100% chance I would not watch that show. There is at least 5% chance I will watch Sportscenter.
 
#15      

Ransom Stoddard

Ordained Dudeist Priest
Bloomington, IL
Len Elmore let go from their CBB team. That's perhaps the one I'd notice the most. He's not great, but certainly reliable.

I can't understand how Eamonn Brennan lasted this long, it seemed like his "content" was just there to fill up space. And Dana O'Neill...I won't miss her ACC cheerleading.
 
#16      

BirdDog9048

The Chief Lives
Chicago, IL
Others...

Jay Crawford, Trent Dilfer (right before the draft!), Danny Kanell, Pierre LeBrun (during the SC playoffs!) and Jim Bowden.

...
Scott Burnside, too. It's always been pretty clear that ESPN doesn't really care about hockey, and now they can go all-in on not caring.
 
#18      
Dick Vitale is the Ted Baxter of ESPN.

Ha! This is so on the money!

As far as Doug Glanville, Jayson Stark, Jim Bowden, and some of the other baseball talent let go by ESPN - it would be great if the Cubs would go after one. Have you watched David DeJesus with Kaplan on pre/post game shows. Did he even interview for this job? He is so bad. Going from Todd hollingsworth to DeJesus? Just Awful! He can't put a complete sentence together without losing his train of thought.
 
#19      
Have you watched David DeJesus with Kaplan on pre/post game shows. Did he even interview for this job? He is so bad. Going from Todd hollingsworth to DeJesus? Just Awful! He can't put a complete sentence together without losing his train of thought.

But have you seen his wife? Dude must do something right.

Doug Glanville would be perfect as the top baseball guy on CSN. Get him a weekly spot on some of the WSCR shows... And he already has a North Side L station named after him... it's a natural fit.
 
#20      
Britt McHenry and Andy Katz are the big names to come out today.

McHenry will still work the draft because she'll have so much more to contribute than, say, Trent Dilfer for example.
 
#21      
It'll definitely be interesting to see how ESPN changes their content/programming as a result of all this.
 
#22      

breadman

Herndon, VA
Just further proving that ESPN has no concern in actually covering sports but creating reality-type talk shows to fill air spaces between east coast games. If we never have another game on there I would be totally fine with it.

Ah, yes. I can remember when MTV use to only play music.
 
#23      
Ha! This is so on the money!

As far as Doug Glanville, Jayson Stark, Jim Bowden, and some of the other baseball talent let go by ESPN - it would be great if the Cubs would go after one. Have you watched David DeJesus with Kaplan on pre/post game shows. Did he even interview for this job? He is so bad. Going from Todd hollingsworth to DeJesus? Just Awful! He can't put a complete sentence together without losing his train of thought.

For real entertainment watch a Cardinal game when Al Hrabosky is on. He'd make DeJesus look like Walter Cronkite.