ESPN has been in serious financial straits lately because of subscription decline, and new subscribers have grinded to a vicious halt because of their absurdly obvious liberal bias.
And this absurdly obvious liberal bias forced ESPN to reconsider how big they can claim the title “The Worldwide Leader in Sports”, because in reality they fired over 100 on-air personalities – they just couldn’t keep up with conservative changing world.
Now it seems that another sports leader, Sports Illustrated, might be weary of following in the same path as ESPN.
Breitbart reports:
“On the heels of ESPN laying off some 100 writers and on-air radio and TV talent, Sports Illustrated announced on Friday that they are laying off five of their staffers, including Seth Davis who has been writing for the iconic sports magazine since 1995.
Earlier in the week, SI parent company Time Inc. saw their stock plummet to $13 a share from $15 after the company rejected an offer to be purchased at $18 a share.
Davis stated that he plans on continuing with his writing career and will depart from SI with no hard feelings: ‘I have not an ounce of regret or bitterness. This is the way the industry is headed. SI is a great place with great people.’
Breitbart News reported in April that ESPN’s layoffs may be the ‘leading edge’ of the coming ‘sports bubble.’
The SI layoffs demonstrate that prediction may be right on the money. TV Answer Man Phillip Swan’s opinion that because channels began raising their fees five years ago to ‘unprecedented levels’ to pay for enormous contracts to broadcast games proved to be a seminal moment in ESPN’s decline.
Swan writes, ‘Customers started to howl over the annual bill hikes, and that led to talk that they would drop their pay TV service, a practice known as cord-cutting.’
Moreover, Swan explains, ‘The woes of the sports channels continued with several pay TV operators deciding to eliminate ESPN from low-cost programming packages in an effort to attract young people.
The decision has cost ESPN several million viewers over the last year or so, leaving the sports network with shrinking profits and declining advertising revenue, which led to yesterday’s firings.’”
The problem is that ESPN feels like a bland stream of liberal talking heads regurgitating the exact same ideas over and over again. And it’s like that all day.
In fact, the hot “takes” you hear on “Mike and Mike in the Morning” at 6 am EST is the exact same redundant vomit you’ll hear from Jemele Hill and Michael Smith on the new and insufferable “SC6” at 6pm EST. Unless there’s breaking news, it’s the same thing all day.
And the liberal takes on sports issues extends to politics and is still all the same, whether you’re reading an article in a magazine or listening to a talking-head on any channel.
But Sports Illustrated is consciously taking action and trying to avoid being lumped in with ESPN’s liberal bias.
Breitbart concluded:
“Clay Travis and others argue that it’s not just the untenable contracts to broadcast sporting events that are killing ESPN, other sports networks, and magazines. It’s their penchant for liberal political views and their insistence on political correctness.
‘I’m not saying that ESPN should just stick to sports, but I am saying that if you decide to allow political opinions to flourish from your network’s stars that you shouldn’t neuter all conservative opinion and allow liberal political opinion to advance unchecked.
That’s not a marketplace of ideas, that’s a totalitarian government. Those with liberal opinions are rewarded and allowed to speak freely, those with conservative opinions are told to keep their mouths shut.’
Conservative viewers aren’t stupid, they see exactly what’s happening.”
What’s even weirder is it’s been proven statistically that sports viewers are, on average, more conservative. Maybe they should all wake up and “take that for data!”