“Grantland wasn’t just a bunch of ex-athletes yelling tired cliches at each other trying to substitute loudness for correctness. As such, it did not fit with our audience”
Sounds like it’s been dying off for a while since ESPN canned Simmons. I wish it could go on and keep existing in some sort of independent form, but the news stories make it sound like that’s not an option and everyone will be moving on to new projects.
My impression was they wouldn’t let Simmons take Grandland with him when he got the axe. And so ESPN, under Disney directive to slash budgets, killed the website entirely.
I always liked Bill Simmons, maybe he can get his buddies back together and renew Grantland.
That sucks. I never read ESPN any more but Grantland is the website I get most of my entertainment and sports news from. They had a bunch of great writers.
This stinks.
This really sucks. Grantland was the best thing to come out of ESPN in ages.
I’m ESPECIALLY going to miss their podcasts. NFL podcast, Cheap Heat (wrestling), Watch the Thrones, even when Simmons was still there and he did giant Oscar previews with Connelly.
Only good that can come from this is that the writers who were on that did awesome work and will find new jobs without any trouble
Considering the four editors went off to work with Simmons, I bet a lot of the writers will be joining up with him as well.
I wonder if they’ve registered Grantworld yet. Or Grantland2. Or NotGrantland.
It’s the Internet, it costs next to nothing to publish something. The new Grantland can be up and running by next Tuesday.
It was the equivalent of a hemorrhoid, No if they can only get rid of the moronic fivethreeeight that has Tom Paine telling us that Alex Rodriguez didn’t need to use PEDs because he had great stats when he was using PEDs.
I’d go stronger than “stinks”, but it’s really the timing that is more of a surprise than the inevitable end.
Dammit. Why can’t we have nice things?
Well, I’m pissed. I loved the site and read it daily, but I knew once Simmons was canned that the site was in its final days.
Skip and Stephen A. must have needed new beach houses.
Why was it called Grantland, anyway?
Though probably not as “Grantland,” since I’m sure ESPN owns the trademark and domain.
Almost certainly named after sportswriter Grantland Rice, a legend in the business.
Mostly because of Bill Simmons. I think ESPN probably would have kept Grantland running despite it losing tons of money and getting little traffic. However, Simmons hired away 4 editors on the condition that they not tell ESPN they were leaving. The report is that he did this in order to hurt ESPN.
I suppose you can argue it’s just business, but I don’t see why ESPN is necessarily the bad guy here given they sunk millions into a bottomless pit of a website that, while entertaining, was basically a vanity project for a former employer, an employee who made things much worse by making a concerted effort to pick off the assets the website had in the most damaging way possible. It was basically fait accompli once ESPN knew they couldn’t count on their employees being relatively loyal to the site or their bosses.
The good thing about the Internet age is that there are plenty of options, so intelligent commentators generally find a way to land on their feet. Heck, look at Keith Olbermann.
If Simmons has any sense…and he does…he’ll get the Kickstarter or Patreon or whatever up ASAP, make his plea, get his backing, and get his show back on the road within the month.
A blow, but not a catastrophic one. I took the end of Television Without Pity far worse. That one was irreplaceable.
Its a shame. One of my favorite websites.
My understanding is that the writers are under contract, so they can’t just leave like the producers did. ESPN will use them in other projects, and there won’t be any further pop culture media.
Im really going to miss Watch the Thrones
Bill Simmon’s new website, TheRinger.com , just went live in the past hour. It seems to be a lot like Grantland, but Simmons said that there won’t be as many long-form stories as there were.
I am fully aware that there is a lot of bias in this because I loved Grantland and I am a Simmons fan, so keep that in mind.
I remember one of the things Simmons saying when he left was that ESPN never truly believed in Grantland, and they refused to promote it or really put ESPNs full power behind it. I thought to myself “yeah, that’s probably true” but also figured it was a bit of sour grapes on Simmons’ part.
Now, in the last couple weeks, The Undefeated (also hailed as “Black Grantland”) came out on ESPN and their stories are being tweeted by ESPN personalities, it’s being put on the front page of the website, it’s reporters and stories are being hailed on Sportscenter. I don’t know if it’s a race thing (it is, but not entirely) or what, but I can’t imagine thinking “If Grantland was promoted as hard as The Undefeated is…would we still have the website today?”.
The Ringer is fine and all. But I miss what I can’t have. I miss Cheap Heat with Shoemaker and Rosenberg, I miss the NFL show with Mays and Barnwell. I miss reading Wesley Morris. I miss Grantland as it was…instead of what it kinda-sorta is now.
Ok, rant over.
ESPN has been cycling new personalities and features while slashing some of those who have been around for a while. This is all thanks to marching orders from Disney, whose stock price is significantly impacted by folks cutting the cord and ESPN losing subscribers. ESPN’s NFL coverage will be almost unrecognizable next season without Cris Carter, Keyshawn Johnson, Mike Ditka, Ray Lewis, Mike Tirico, and possibly others leaving (looking at you, Chris Berman).
They lost Ditka?
I knew about CC and Tirico, didn’t know (or care honestly) about Key and Ray, but losing Ditka is news to me.