Money is tight across sports media, and many people are losing their jobs because of it.
Weeks after layoffs hit both ESPN and Sports Illustrated, Yahoo appears to be the next site to cut costs by cutting jobs.
This week, two editors of Yahoo’s Puck Daddy hockey blog tweeted that they had been laid off. Both said they’d been told the decision was “budgetary.”
Unrestricted free agent about to hit the market. pic.twitter.com/71g8XZvbHb
— Jen Neale (@MsJenNeale_PD) May 17, 2017
Yesterday I was informed that I am no longer with Yahoo for budgetary reasons. Appreciative of my time there but excited for what's next
— Josh Cooper (@JoshuaCooper) May 17, 2017
The latest
- Kirk Herbstreit picked Alabama over Florida State even before Jordan Travis injury: ‘No way the SEC champ’s left out’
- Peyton Manning lost his mind over Bengals’ terrible trick play
- Prime Video draws record audience for Week 13 Seahawks-Cowboys ‘Thursday Night Football’
- ESPN’s Ryan Clark deletes post after casually breaking news about quarterback transferring to Ohio State
It is unclear whether cuts at Yahoo will be confined to the hockey staff or whether they’ll affect other sports as well.
Yahoo as a whole has struggled financially for quite a while and last year sold itself to Verizon. Now, the company’s larger problems seem to be affecting its sports operation. Last month, Recode reported that NBA breaking news ace Adrian Wojnarowski will leave Yahoo for ESPN this summer and take some of the staff at The Vertical with him. Though Wojnarowski has not confirmed that report, he also has not denied it.
At this point, layoffs are a part of the sports media industry that aren’t going away any time soon, but it’s still jarring to see so many people lose their jobs in such a short period of time. And for hockey fans, it’s particularly upsetting that both ESPN and Yahoo seem to be scaling back their hockey coverage.
We’ll update this post if we hear anything more about Yahoo Sports’ layoffs.