The next two years could turn out to be a changing of the guard in sports media, as legends like Stephen A. Smith, Colin Cowherd and Skip Bayless all negotiate new deals at ESPN and Fox. At the same time, as seen with recent high-profile negotiations between Ryan Clark and ESPN, younger talents are flexing newfound power and potentially jeopardizing the talent pipeline for traditional media companies. Discussing this evolution, Dan Le Batard is now arguing that in fact all sports media personalities are replaceable.
In a Monday edition of The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz, the longtime columnist, radio host and media exec Le Batard said Clark’s talks with ESPN highlighted the lack of leverage sports media personalities have.
“Even if you’re Ryan Clark, all of the pieces except for just a few are almost entirely interchangeable,” Le Batard argued. “I’m having a hard time thinking of anybody who can leave just about anywhere and actually do damage to a major, mainstream platform.”
After cohost Jon “Stugotz” Weiner suggested that only ESPN’s live sports games had true value to the company’s bottom line, Le Batard followed by questioning “Why pay anyone millions?”
Le Batard offered himself and the rest of the show’s crew, which left to form Meadowlark Media in early 2021, as a perfect example.
“It’s hurt ESPN not at all to not have us,” Le Batard said.
Certainly, at a time in which there is exponentially more content created each day than anyone could reasonably consume, someone like Clark is not going to make or break whether someone tunes into ESPN. And it’s no secret that games are why people tune into ESPN. Especially as news moved from television to social media, all other ESPN programming became far less necessary.
Still, Fox Sports 1 is a perfect example of how problems arise with lesser talent and programming. After all, FS1 has Craig Carton competing with Mike Greenberg.
One could easily make the case that ESPN is in fact in a more desperate position to attract strong talent given the plethora of digital video options that can overtake First Take or The Pat McAfee Show in the coming years.
So while Clark himself was not going to change ESPN’s fortunes, it matters that when NFL fans tune into ESPN, they see someone intelligent, polished and passionate on their screens. That keeps them coming back, albeit less so than the existence of Monday Night Football itself.
There is a point of no return if ESPN were truly to operate with the type of laissez-faire attitude Le Batard is suggesting.
[The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz on YouTube]
