More Cuts at ESPN

About a decade ago, Finn worked at the Globe in design or something like that. He had a personal blog about the Red Sox and Boston sports in general. Boston.com started hosting it and he became a "voice of the fan" type on the site with his blog, weekly chats, and video debates with Bob Ryan or whomever. He was never a homer, but he wrote about the experience of watching and would discuss plays and managerial decisions to a degree you wouldn't see in the paper. A lot changed as boston.com increasingly became separated from The Boston Globe. However, Finn started writing for the Globe as the sports media writer after the position had been eliminated a while back. I believe he still has his day job in laying out the paper.

 

Money quote from Deadspin yesterday....

 

So? The rights fees are locked in through the term of the deal. Is Deadspin suggesting ESPN shouldn't be cutting costs when it's bleeding subscribers?

 

There is definitely a balance, no question. The older I have gotten, the more that I "pick my spots" when it comes to each workday. My fear, I suppose, is that I love what I do so much that I don't mind putting in the extra effort. That approach has survived six station layoffs in 20 years in the business.

Eventually, the blade will get me and I know this.

 

First good news out of the whole damn story

 

The one canning I don't feel bad over.

 

She's an awful human being with a beautiful face. She'll be fine in this world.

 

There are 74 or so Fox Regional Sports Networks looking for sideline reporters. She'll be on a sideline, asking her two questions of Coach at halftime, by next Wednesday.

 

NFL rights are almost two billion a year. 100 people got let go. If they all made an average of a million a year, that's still nothing.

Further fun with math. If all 8000 or so of ESPN employees worldwide made a quarter of a million a year, and you laid 7950 of them off, leaving just a kid on the 50-yard line with a cell phone for each game, that would pay for one year's rights.

So they're just diminishing the product , which drives away more subscribers.