'Bloody Monday at Kansas City Star'

One or both might already be in negotiations with the Denver Post, which hopes to lure over the columnists' readership. 8)

 

I'm assuming the smiley face means you're joking... ;D

 

Joking, yeah.
Just thought that's what the Denver Post does these days, picking up columnists left at the curb. Assuming anyone is, in this case ... oh, never mind.

 

I'm guessing Whitlock will be exclusively at one of the onlines by the end of the week.

 

That'd be hard for a lot of Kansas Citians to stomach because Whitlock and Posnanski are HUGE there, as we can all imagine. Posnanski is pretty much universally loved, and Whitlock obviously has his haters but is the most popular media figure in that town by a long shot.

I have to think they're going to try to hold on those two whatever it takes, if only because it would do a lot to mask the fact that they're destroying that product and don't want the subscribers to realize it.

 

They'll have to do something. Posnanski and Whitlock are two great columnists, Kerkhoff knows his college sports and Dutton, God bless him, follows the Royals and knows a lot about baseball.

My hope is that KC doesn't hack the shit out of sports like they're planning the rest of the paper, but it's likely a pipe dream.

 

I'd say about 40 percent of the people I know who regularly visit the Star's Web site, do so only to read Whitlock and Posnanski.

Keep in mind that a lot of the people I know who visit the Star's Web site are doing to because it is the competition.

 

I love Whitlock. I love Posnanski. Let's assume, just for the sake of argument that both make in the $250K range. If I had to guess, I would bet that's in the low range, but I have no idea.

Is keeping one of them worth keeping five other employees? I don't know the answer to that. It may very well be yes.

Knowing both of them, it wouldn't surprise me if one stepped up and agreed to a buyout. By that same token, neither should be expected to and if the Star decides to keep both and shred the rest of the staff, I wouldn't blame them.

Tough decisions are coming. The Star would not be the same without either one of them, but I have a feeling that in about 48 hours, The Star isn't going to resemble what it is now.

 

I would suspect they keep both columnists, and should.

The Miami Herald hasn't touched its columnist lineup (although it remains to be seen, I have to admit, whether LeBatard returns from sabbatical).

 

Posnanski is writing for SI, something you can tell by his blog he truly loves doing.
He has his blog, which is very successful.
And he has a burgeoning book career.
He could very easily fall on the sword and be fine.

 

They'll keep both columnists. I bet they won't even have to take the 10 percent cuts either. Like somebody said, if they dump one, it will be telling that community their sports page now has been cut to shit. Nobody notices when the other writers get fired. If they have any high school people left, they'll cut that back to one reporter and probably keep all the high school editors because editors are the last to go.

 

Imagine how much the web hits would increase if both columnists talked more about pro athletes and their cup sizes ...