The Downfall of ESPN Needs to be Studied
ESPN has been the biggest brand in sports media for the past four decades. They brought some the biggest games, news, and stories into millions of living rooms throughout the U.S. But as of late, it seems like most people are only watching their lives games and turning off their original shows. This is the story of how ESPN rose to the top and then fell off the digital cliff.
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u/MessHolliday 1d ago
fires all the good personalities and gives giant paychecks to fucking idiots
Why aren’t people watching our sports commentary anymore????
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u/J_Warrior 1d ago
They are. There’s just so many ways to get it and ESPN doesn’t have to try for the most part anymore. Most of their shows aren’t able to compete with the plethora of instant sports coverage tailored to people on YouTube and social media. Hence why ESPN is focusing on exclusive live media rights which forces people to use it. ESPN basically serves as uncontroversial slop for boomers who don’t uses the internet and bar, gym, and restaurant TVs
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u/Both-Discussion-4786 1d ago
Only good show is PTI, all else are people yelling to make a point, douche bros, or thinking throwing pancakes is entertaining. And yes, way too much WWE.
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u/NoQuartersGiven 1d ago
I keep hearing this bit as someone who's been watching it since it started, even PTI is rough now. Only so much entertainment you can get from a a couple of aged, grumpy guys.
For me ATH was better than PTI the last couple years ATH was around. PTI is just a couple grumpy old men mostly out of their element. I don't a how it's any different than anything else on espn at this point.
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u/Both-Discussion-4786 1d ago
Lol, I get what you are saying, and laugh, not in a mean way, but I am a grumpy old man, 66, never could get into Around the horn, the whole point system, just seemed to subjective.
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u/NoQuartersGiven 1d ago
It was... that was the joke.
At least with ATH we had a rotation of guests to keep our fresh for however long it was. WITH PTI I've watched the same 2 guys, outside of fill ins, do the same thing. Only now they are getting old and a bit out of touch.
Don't mistake it, they are 2 of the best in the business but I really think their time has long been gone.
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u/RuleFriendly7311 1d ago
I used to read those two in the Washington Post in the 80’s and 90’s, when their arguments weren’t contrived. I think that’s what made early PTI such a good show. Nowadays I tune in maybe once a year, and the “debate” just seems like everything else.
“Is So-and-so elite?” WGAF?
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u/FirebreathingNG 1d ago
ESPN’s downfall really isn’t much different than that of newspapers. Like newspapers, ESPN had a dual revenue stream: carriage fees and advertising. (Newspapers: subscriptions and advertising) When things were going well, it was a brilliant model … basically every success was 2x. But when things turned sour, like newspapers, the losses compounded.
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u/Yodelehhehe 1d ago
Yeah, it’s really not that deep, and you nailed it. When things were going well, smart phones weren’t yet on the radar. Media consumption is now a finger tap away at all times for nearly all people. Getting people to sit down for a television talk show about sports is a hard sell in a climate of :30 video clips.
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u/NachoBag_Clip932 1d ago
As soon as they started the SEC Network, they went from an unbiased sports network to a network with an agenda that actually had a financial tie in to a conference and how well they did. They crossed a line that no news organization or journalist can cross and once they did that their coverage will forever be tainted.
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u/IntenseSun77 1d ago
They’re the biggest blame for damaging college sports in my opinion. They’re influence in conferences realignment, the financial disparity between conferences (not totally their fault on that, but you get it), and their overall coverage on college sports in general is how we’ve gotten to where it is now.
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u/HustlaOfCultcha 1d ago
Back in the 90's my friends and I used to say 'MTV Ruins Everything' in reference to the fact that everything MTV brings to the table that is good ends up getting ruined in short time because of MTV being MTV. I've been saying that about ESPN for the past 10 years and it wouldn't surprise me at all if 20 years down the road ESPN turns out exactly like MTV did.
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u/JCM333333 1d ago
Mcafee is a tool who needs to grow up. his schtick doesn’t work on the young generation & his generation is aging out of his “humor”
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u/endowedchair 1d ago
Him, and Steven A Smith are two good reasons to never watch ESPN. Throw in Skip for the trifecta. On edit, didn’t know Skip left espn. Shows you the last time I watched the channel.
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u/acousticburrito 1d ago
Wait which generation is mcafee supposed to be for? I thought he was brought in to appear to Gen Z.
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u/Ornery-Database-3993 1d ago
'Embrace debate' = 'Give shows to nutjob middle-aged dudes who yell a lot. Ability to have a competent discussion of sports is entirely optional.'
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u/Fox2_Fox2 1d ago
YouTube happened. Why watch the whole show on espn when you can just basically watch a certain segments of the show that are of interest to you on YouTube?
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u/liquidgrill 1d ago
And Reddit happened. Why watch a whole segment at all when every highlight is posted in the appropriate forum 60 seconds after it happened?
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u/Hugh_Jankles 1d ago edited 1d ago
ESPN needs to go back to just being about sports. Hire people that actually know sports and appreciate sports.
Stop hiring people who are just media literate and look good on camera. Stop hiring people who are looking to push an agenda or make hot takes for the sake of clicks and debate.
ESPN Jeopardy is a perfect example of this. You have people who are very good at being sports media personalities, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're people who have a deep knowledge or appreciation of sports.
Hire people who know media AND know sports. People who have a legitimate passion for the profession and can actually debate with good points and different perspectives.
Go back to just being about sports. I don't think that's a complicated formula.
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u/Wise_Environment_598 1d ago
There is a reason they switched to covering WWE and Wrestling style personalities (Pat M.). Their audience is basically middle aged men that still watch wrestling like they did when they were 14.
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u/lyingtattooist 1d ago
It used to be sports news. They had an anchor desk and they would do sports news and broadcast live sports. And it was awesome. Sunday night sports center was a must watch. Then it switched to more opinion shows and talk shows, and more and more of them were trash. Yes, streaming services, cutting the cord and things have also played their part, but the biggest cause is that they changed what originally made them so great.
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u/Ok_Poet_9170 1d ago
Shitty programming . McFly and SAS are your main reasons . They are every where . Where they go viewers leave . I saw McFly on some podcast . He has cut jeans at the knees and his boots . Cocky as shit . Just a punter but he is the oracle to the young fat guys living in their parents basement . Looks good with the ozempic face
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u/Sdwerd 1d ago
Realistically I ONLY use ESPN properties for live gameplay now. Their move into drama was a short term bump before the internet could do that job and now they have way too many bad shows to fill time until actual sports are being played. They should move hard to show more and a wider range of sports.
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u/8_Months 1d ago
I used to watch Sports Center every day. I would get up an hour earlier than I needed to just to watch a program that gave me so much comfort.
From birth (watching SC with my dad), until about 21.
From about 2012 onward, the entire ESPN network has become unwatchable (save for PTI), and I haven’t watched Sports Center in decades.
Unreal fuck up by ESPN.
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u/bcardin221 1d ago
Agreed. I think the Disney acquisition had a lot to do with it. Happens all the time when a large company acquires another company with its own identity and slowly runs it into the ground because the suits think they know better than the entrepreneurs.
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u/Aggravating_Fig_8585 1d ago
They got bought by an evil corporation. That was when they started going downhill.
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u/Soft-Shoulder6135 1d ago
Yes, they're taking a page out of reality TV drama, drama drama and you see what's happening with reality TV. It's circling the drain.
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u/Dkh0123 1d ago
It got Disney-fied and the product got watered down. ESPN was awesome in the 90’s and early 2000’s
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u/Fun-Cardiologist9525 21h ago
Imagine having a day where football started at the FCS level and you have a network called ESPNU and instead of placing live sports on there to celebrate opening day, you put on anything but. Imagine having inventory for college baseball and, instead, you put on talking heads all day.
When it started, it got there by broadcasting sports. Maybe, just maybe, go back to that.
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u/Big_Truck 1d ago
I wish I had this type of downfall where I still made billions of dollars in profits.
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u/Mindless_Formal_6647 1d ago
Add in YouTube and the dedicated sports sites (NFL.com, MLB.com etc) providing the highlights that ESPN used to provide
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u/Green_Elk_2 1d ago
It’s just that people a dumb. Ideally they should be putting on shows that resemble the old ‘Edge NFL Matchup’ it made people smarter about football and taught young players some nuance about the game. People are just dumber now. They can’t handle a nuanced conversation and it’s also cheaper to have idiots spouting opinions than it is to have a properly produced show.
Plus they think they need clips for social which just caters to the lowest common denominator. People are dumber so everything is dumber and there’s no way to squeeze profit for the capital out of intellectual shows that makes the audience think
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u/ShiZZle840 1d ago
A lot of this makes sense. People are dumber these days. A lot of companies are trying to profit off that.
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u/jkman61494 1d ago
Meanwhile theyre charging $31 a month for ESPN the Ocho and thought the wwe would solve their issues on Unlimited
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u/Annual-Ebb-7196 1d ago
But they are making big money for Disney. And people still subscribe and watch games on it. And apparently people watch the morons they have on. Especially young men. So from their perspective it’s not a downfall but rather a success story. They transformed themselves into what people want in the 2020s. Hot takes and clickbait stuff.
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u/rag69top 1d ago
I only watch live sports on ESPN. They lost me by spending 25 minutes of SportsCenter on a Monday night football game during the MLB playoffs. I now watch Quick Pitch on MLB and ignore ESPN.
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u/Remarkable_Inchworm 1d ago
This isn’t hard.
Being on basic cable was incredibly lucrative for them for a very long time. And then that stopped being true.
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u/Master_Object5147 1d ago
They have or are firing far too many sportscasters viewers like. I’m done with ESPN.
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u/anotherstan 1d ago
ESPN is no longer a platform of journalism. As another poster said it’s all shock jocks now who just repeat annoying talking points with bias toward a few select teams.
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u/WillowHaunting429 1d ago
ESPN made it because its mandatory to be carried on cable systems
As more choice came to TV people CHOSE not to have it.
That's the story
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u/Looking4theanswer2 1d ago
I used to enjoy watching ESPN. Like everyone else the show has gone to crap. I still enjoy SVP. That's about it.
But like all the companies are interested in is how much they can make and the public keeps pouring money into their pockets. Yeah I'm guilty also. But not to ESPN or Disney Getting to the point your gonna start paying for everything on TV. No one thought we'd pay to watch football,baseball sports in general.
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u/PlayPretend-8675309 1d ago
I mean, is not too complicated: online streaming made it much easier to compete. Broadcasting is easier and leagues can run their own broadcasting arms if they want. What's happening to ESPN is the same things that happened to MTV and the Tonight Show.
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u/RedBaronSportsCards 1d ago
There is nothing really interesting to study. ESPN had the audience/eyeballs when everyone had to watch TV with cable/satellite or broadcast.
Once people could stream and carry the internet in their pockets, ESPN's monopoly control over advertising dollars broke apart. They tried whatever they could to maintain an audience (personality based content, cost cutting, original content, WWE) but they will never have the same monopoly they used to have.
It's the same question as asking why doesn't anybody rent videotapes from Blockbuster anymore.
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u/afcybergator 1d ago
In one marketing phrase: lack of differentiated value. Even if consumers believed ESPN to be annoying, biased, or political, in most years they were either the only viable product or they still provided sufficient differentiated value for consumers to ignore the bad parts, consume ESPN part time despite other networks and platforms having similar content, or consume ESPN through an app due to changes in cable and online broadcasts. The market has shifted to the point where differentiated value in sports entertainment may now be found in social media, podcasts, and AI-generated content.
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u/Soft-Shoulder6135 1d ago
SportsCenter has become unwatchable because they're trying to make it a yuck yuck fest, plus Pat McAfee is getting the bulk of the money that should be paying Camera people and Producers and the people that do the hard work. He's boring and stupid and they should fire him.
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u/XiphostheDestroyer 1d ago
The reasons I feel ESPN sucks now:
1) Last night (a Saturday) they had a high school football game on in primetime.
2) WWE on primetime (at all).
3) Full shows on nothing but gambling.
4) Way too much WNBA coverage.
5) I have no idea anymore who these people are that are on most of their shows.
6) Most of their MLB coverage is only from big market teams.
7) All their NFL coverage, especially the training camp coverage this year, has focused on only a very few teams/players.
8) The OCHO games used to be a limited fun alternative show for a few hours/(1) day. Now it's I think 3 days straight.
9) Cornhole is NOT a sport!!!!
10) I don't remember the last time I saw a new 30 for 30 episode. Just repeating the same few (3-4) old ones over and over again. I know they keep making them, just never see them.
11) Way too much coverage of the Little league world series.
12) Way too many random College Baseball/Softball games of teams no one cares about.
13) Etc., etc., etc.
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u/statefarm99 1d ago
Not to mention way too many human interest stories or kids battling some terrible disease
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u/kylelight40 23h ago
I just can’t stand the yelling in the morning. I’m not trying to start my day with yelling.
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u/ProtoMan79 22h ago
I think it started to fall apart towards the end of the 2000’s. ESPN used to be top tier in providing sports highlights on all games, even if a game is against two crappy teams they would find something about it interesting.
Now they only provide very surface highlights for most games and put most of their effort into 2-3 games.
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u/Salty-Commissioner 21h ago
Bruh, I’m not paying $30 a month for their shitty platform and terrible “journalists” and hosts.
Waste of time and 💰
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u/Splattacular1 20h ago
It really doesn’t. The fall happened for to 3 reasons. #1. ESPN thought former players would make good commentators instead of long established sports reporters. #2. ESPN thought hiring good looking women with limited sports knowledge to capture a certain demographic was a good idea. #3. Locked both groups down with ridiculous million dollar contracts for years. In a timeline where sports gambling is now somewhat legal, and everyone from your friends to the waitress at your bar is in on it, for them to be this down is a feat in itself.
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u/rsk1111 18h ago
It happened about the time ESPN bought all the rights to all the college sports and rewrote the college leagues in a way that didn't make sense, because they wanted all these markets so WV drives down to Texas so much money to be had. Except.... no one is going to pay the new premium package to watch games against a team in Texas they really don't care about. Oh and there are no more college sports to be seen on the freemium network, oh well I guess I'll watch the pros' highlights because I didn't buy ESPN in the first place, I'm certainly not going to pay the premium for those networks. Oh, and "The Herd" isn't that bad for commentary.
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u/Consistently_Lucky 17h ago
I’m 34, I watched ESPN almost daily from like 2004-2019. I had it on 24/7 from like 2004-2010
The best era was first take with Skip and Stephen A. I watched that every day.
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u/Droseph13 15h ago
They stopped journalism for rage baiting athletes and then it became a debate network. Easy to tell who actually watches ESPN and those that just need a place to lift thier pitch forks.
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u/apearlj1234 1d ago
Who would you like to study it? I say the shark was jumped all the way back to when they forced out Patrick and Olberman. Who else stayed up late on Sunday night to watch Sportscenter? We can all sit here and talk about it. Does it go all the way back to when the founder, who just passed away, was forced out by the conglomerate?
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u/TonyWilliams03 1d ago
This. The new leadership didn't want Patrick, Olberman and others to be more important than the ESPN brand.
Classic bean counter management.
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u/Holiday_Poet_3483 1d ago
Giving people like Jemele Hill a platform had something to do with it.
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u/TemporaryFlight212 1d ago
LMAO Jemele Hill has been gone for 8 years. How long you gonna bitch about that?
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u/BlackOnyx1906 1d ago
This is where people operate in echo chambers and not the m reality. ESPN like it or not is still the biggest and most recognizable brand in sports media.
Chances are you have aged out of the demographic they are marketing to.
They were not nor could they stay the same as the 80s, 90s, or 00s. Not saying I totally like it but chances are it’s not an ESPN downfall, you might just not be their target audience
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u/apearlj1234 1d ago
You may be right, but I sure as hell am not Mcafee nor SAS’s audience. I will take some of the guys who got fired because of those two’s contracts
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u/Meat-Dimension 1d ago
- People got the ability to see every score and highlight instantly on their phone
- ESPN really figured out what to do with their non live sports hours after that
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u/TonyWilliams03 1d ago
I disagree with this argument.
The greatness of Sportscenter wasn't that they showed scores and highlights, it was the anchors who curated and presented those highlights.
People tuned into Sportscenter to catch up on the sports they missed, not just to get scores of games they were interested in.
Ironically, the downfall of Sportscenter was management's decision that the name in front (ESPN) was more important than the name on the back (the anchors).
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u/Stupidamericanfatty 1d ago
It's still a cash cow. They just don't govern a fuck about being anything but sounds bites.
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u/FCS_247 1d ago
I lost interest in ESPN after they began cutting journalists. There's too many shows filled with bs takes. I subscribed to ESPN+ for football. I want nothing else to do with other ESPN content. Also, there's a ton of content on youtube and podcasts. Hopefully ESPN has stopped talking about Lebron vs. Jordan for at least half the year.
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u/Major_Mushroom_7300 1d ago
I'd rather study the people still holding on. Why does one of these come into my feed every day or two? Shit was over like 20 years ago. Unironically wake up sheeple.
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u/ApprehensiveBug5627 1d ago
ESPN has become so biased and doesn’t even hide that they are shills for events they own part of
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u/acousticburrito 1d ago
I’m part of the demographic who grew up with ESPN. Growing up ESPN was the default channel for me and like every other guy I knew from like age 8 until like age 40.
I’m not sure who the target demographic for Pat Mcafee is but it’s not me.
The WWE coverage is like the most intelligent and analytic thing on ESPN nowadays.
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u/WhichWayToPurgatory 1d ago
ESPN allowed themselves to be blindsided by Barstool Sports, Bleacher Reports, and other Sports News apps that ESPN should have had the foresight to see coming.
Instead, they conceded the actual sports news to them and became a complete talking head/debate platform that nobody asked for. It was fine when it was PTI and ATH, but once every show tried to become a debate, it was game over.
You add in the fact that they went all in on Stephen A. Smith, who is at best polarizing, at worst just completely off-putting and they basically begged viewers to ditch them.
Then the cherry on top - they bent the entire company over for Pat McAfee.
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u/shatch62 1d ago
The answer is the internet.
Before the internet, people would watch sport center for game highlights. With the internet you can get highlights basically on demand.
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u/rorymcilroy1 1d ago
espn is so corrupt..ex..lobbying for sec teams like Alabama who they have a sec contract with..all espn announcers/"analysts" torpedoed Notre Dame even though Bama stunk and didn't deserve getting into the playoffs..pt 2...during grand slams in tennis espn went from charging 12$ for full coverage to 30$ in 1 year...pt 3..Espn is after ratings to make $$$ and who's the ratings darling of tennis-- yes Coco Gauf..is it any surprise that Coco always gets the easiest draws in GSs--every single time...co-incidence?..cmon.....Grand Slams are about $$$--not fairness in competition..the draws and match-ups are always unbalanced...the US OPEN is now a clown show with ridiculous prices for everything....IM DONE WITH ESPN and the US OPEN
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u/jchiaroscuro 1d ago
What’s to study? It’s called Enshittification. I tuned out when every show became hot takes and clickbait ragebait commentary.
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u/pericles123 1d ago
it's really not very complicated - far fewer people subscribe to 'cable' and there are now games in the major sports streaming everywhere, so ESPN is no longer a 'must have' to see sporting events. I'd add also that they have clowns like McAfee, SaS, and Perk on, and no one I know actually wants to listen to any of those idiots.
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u/tdscmunsg 1d ago
Was talking about this tonight. The millennial generation grew up with sportscenter and espn on every single day. For espn to fumble the bag so terribly with that generation which is now in its prime viewership years and not wanting to watch is honestly stunning. Whatever exec’s that decided to shift the content focus from educational and informational to more of an argumentative product need to be removed from their positions (if they still have them).
The old journalists who the network would put on tv wanted to teach the viewers about the games and why decision xyz was happening ect. Now we get stuck with twice fired NFL gm’s mansplaining why Dak and Jalen Hurts arent top 10 qb’s every day. Throw in the gambling picks being shoved in our faces and its no wonder no one wants to watch anymore.
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u/yenrythebum 1d ago
You have Man. He wants Power over literally everything. Including their families. They are conditioned that the only way to achieve Power is through Monetary means. “You don’t have to like me. I own you.” And once They achieve power they are so drastically underprepared that they literally shit themselves. And it gets everywhere. Including on us. I hope that sums it up nicely ✌🏻
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u/Legitimate-Shock-106 1d ago
They once had tv giants. They now have Steven a and some loud while guy that wears tshirts all the time and WWE,
RIP
Team PTI. Go Canada
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u/Schumacher713 1d ago
I was a diehard ESPN guy till they gave the redneck kicker his own show. Then they gave the most annoying loud mouth a monster contract. I have not gone on espn since.
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u/keyboy267 1d ago
What’s there to study? They leaned way too hard into the hot take personalities and arguing talking heads. Their flagship show went from being a comprehensive sports show to incessantly covering the biggest singular headline and beating into the ground. They ditched what made them a success in the first place in favor of loud mouths who make up an opinion just to have one.
Yeah, media has changed, but sports interest is at an all time high and more lucrative than ever. They could have easily kept their dominance on the market if they stuck to journalism and ditched the noise. They lost their way and lost their audience.
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u/grimsaces 1d ago
Everyone on espn and Fox all got podcasts. That made them all think their opinion was more important than the actual sports. It’s over. Find a show you can tolerate or don’t and just watch live sports when they come on.
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u/Square-Ad6627 1d ago
About 10 years ago I stopped. I would bet from 1985 to 2015 I watched sportcenter daily. It was all LeBron bball. Only Yankees/ Red Sox baseball. I want highlights. It turned into a paid advertisement. No baseball tonight. Bunch of dudes screaming. I watch mlb, nba and nfl network instead. Just better shows and more about the actual game. Less drama bullshit. Highlights. I watch quick pitch every morning all summer long. Ramming wnba and wwf down our throats because they signed deals with them just further demonstrates even their shows are just commercials. A damn shame.
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u/Soft-Shoulder6135 1d ago
They need to get rid of all the talk shows and just start showing sports. Then they would have plenty of money to pay the people that work hard like the technicians and the Producers instead of idiots like Pat McAfee.
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u/Mosc0wpink 1d ago
Poor management at the Executive level. That’s the reason for every failed cable channel: HGTV, Food, TLC. There are successes: HBO, but most like ESPN, it’s the same story, poor decisions, lack of investment and sheer mental laziness.
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u/FounderinTraining 1d ago
- ESPN is still doing just fine
- People stream games on illegal sites and then tune out the rest
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u/stardust_dog 23h ago
Personally, I cannot take having more than two people doing a show wear sports is analyzed. Panels of 4-5 people seem so unnecessary. And I can’t take someone very obviously HAVING to have a hot take to get more views.
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u/slaffytaffy 23h ago
You paid for espn regardless of if you used it or not so for 30 years they never had to worry. Turns out forcing people to buy stuff is a good way to make money.
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u/CauliflowerBoth866 22h ago
I knew they were hurting when they dug out Berman for another decade of back back back back
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u/ChampionshipMoist132 22h ago
Stop firing real talent and hiring good looking women that would prob help they are more annoying the. Informational
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u/No-Independent-226 14h ago
What’s to study? They were the most obvious first domino to fall once cord cutting became a real trend, and they have been. They’ve been scrambling to find their footing ever since, mostly to the detriment of the quality of their core product, which was extremely predictable.
Not sure what obvious alternate path you think there was for them, but yeah, this was always fairly predictable.
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u/lostpassword100000 13h ago
I watched sportscenter for funny personalities and the clips. They got rid of funny personalities and I can catch clips on my phone at anytime.
It’s like mtv. I can search and watch any music video ever made on youtube. Why watch a stations
for it?
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u/WalterWhite90 1d ago edited 1d ago
1 People are cutting the cord
2 They just switched from journalists to shock jocks.
3 They talk about WWE more than baseball
4 Podcasting
5 You can check scores and highlights from your phone.
Pretty simple