Simmons... out!

Very well-stated. It's become a problem not only for Simmons, but for a lot of writers who are online entities.

 

The end of an era. Simmons finally made himself enough of a pain in the ass to not be worth the money.

Bill Simmons was, in many ways, as good of a fit for ESPN as anybody not named Chris Berman. This is true. White, college-educated, upper middle class dude with thoroughly middlebrow tastes and an affinity for 80s TV and 90s NBA, like many of the rest of the white, college-educated upper middle class sports dudes. The 30 for 30 docs, often dubious artistically, were perfect in that regard. Safe nostalgia. Money makers. If nothing else, the Dr. V story proved Simmons is precisely that middlebrow guy, pointing out the "oddities" of the world. Nobody involved with that story stopped very long to think about the mental state/personhood of the subject.

Even though it found itself in the NBA commentary - which is itself is far too narrow a niche - Grantland has long been, in my mind, a costly vanity project, a way for Simmons to buy some cool, millennial talent he doesn't have in himself or the time to explore. The idea that ESPN had to throw more time and money into it...it's unwieldy as it is. It's restless and unfocused. It's a grocery store of twee.

Simmons' transformation from wise-ass to cool journo impresario at ESPN had to have a terminus somewhere. He was no longer content to be good at what he was good at doing, and ESPN, at long last, was tired of giving him more money to find such contentment.

It should go without saying someone will give him a billion dollars to run his own sports site.

 

This is the Bizzaro World Simmons take--essentially the polar opposite of what I usually hear--which is that his NBA stuff is outstanding, his NFL stuff not nearly as good, and his Pat/Sox stuff downright insufferable.

 

IF TBL is to be believed, ESPN couldn't justify Simmons' $6 million a year asking price for the amount of revenue he drives. Especially with contract negotiations coming up for First Take and Mike and Mike, which are both hot garbage, but HUGE money makers for ESPN.

 

Ugh. How much do those four guys pull in?

 

Dunno, but Skipper told folks if ESPN was paying Simmons' $6 million a year, what would he have to pay those money-making ass clowns?

 

Well, the Celtics sucked when he started at ESPN, and he made his bones there by calling Roger Clemens the antichrist, pushing the Sox/Yankees rivalry, and sitting front row as the Pats won their first Super Bowl. The timing was perfect. His NBA stuff might be great, I can't say, because I hate the NBA and stopped watching it once the one-and-done generation killed college basketball IMHO. He recognized his niche was gonna be the NBA, so hat's off to him, but a vast majority of his columns were NBA-centric, and I couldn't care less about it.

 

Simmons' NBA attachment makes me wonder if he could actually end up at Bleacher Report, which is owned by Turner/TNT. Have to think that aligning with an NBA rights holder makes the most sense for both sides.

 

Yep. And it belonged to a different time, too.

I give Simmons credit for the 30/30 thing. It was a good idea. It was kind of an obvious idea, but it was his, and it prolonged his time at ESPN many years.

Grantland is his white whale.

 

From Deadspin

 

I like what I like on Grantland but overall I appreciate the site for what it tried to be and it was never going to be a money machine. And that's okay too. The shit that makes money at ESPN, like First Take, is fucking atrocious.

30 for 30 was good although I didn't need to see two documentaries on The U but some of the stuff was quite good and topics I never thought I would find interesting, like the Baltimore Colts Band, proved to be quite charming stories.

I guess Skipper is dumping Simmons to go with Whitlock. That's a decision that could you fired quickly.

 

$3.4M, huh?