- ESPN laid off 20 on-air personalities and the New York Times decided to close its sports desk.
- More news jobs have already been cut this year than in all of 2022 and 2021, per a firm that tracks layoffs.
- Industry experts explain the three media trends that could replace traditional sports journalism.
2023 has been a rough year for sports media.
More than 150 jobs have been cut in recent layoffs across ESPN, Sports Illustrated, Warner Bros. Discovery, The Athletic, and NFL Media.
Even without layoffs, major publications are erasing sports roles. In July, the New York Times announced it would shutter its sports department, redirecting writers to other parts of the newsroom, while leaving sports coverage to The Athletic, which the Times purchased for $550 million last year. On the opposite coast, the Los Angeles Times decided to stop its routine sports coverage, including game recaps, box scores, and standings.
“They probably are having a hard time figuring out a model to make that type of reporting really profitable,” Andy Challenger of the outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas told Insider. “It’s probably not great news for the rest of the industry.”
The Grim Reaper is coming for sports media, the last stronghold of live must-see TV, which had been somewhat insulated from the effects of a media industry hit hard by digitization.
In the first six months of the year, Challenger’s firm recorded a staggering 18,836 job cuts announced in media, compared to less than 4,000 in all of 2021 and 2022. The group tracked 2,091 cuts in news alone during the same period, already outpacing total losses in the past two years. Challenger said he anticipates layoffs to continue at this pace “at least through the end of the year.”
Sports journalism as we know it is under fire — from AI, the shift to streaming, the rising costs of TV deals, local news deserts, and plenty of other factors. But Challenger and other experts say the demand for sports content isn’t going anywhere: it’s just going to look, and sound, a little different.
Here are the three biggest changes industry experts told Insider are redefining sports coverage.
Younger voices for younger audiences
Industry experts say that while news organizations reorganize and sports sections get thinner, the demand for sports coverage hasn’t gone away. Sports-media personalities who connect directly with fans through podcasts, Twitch, and YouTube channels are providing the game analysis historically found on the sports page, said Conrad Wiacek, who heads sports analysis at GlobalData.
“That expertise doesn’t change, just the medium in which you deliver it has,” Wiacek said.
Wiacek said that the 18- to 30-year-old demographic is key for traditional media organizations, yet the hardest to reach. This subset keeps up with their favorite teams on digital platforms and social media.
Pat McAfee is the exemplar of ESPN’s latest efforts to reach a younger audience. The company struck in May a deal that will pay the former Indianapolis Colts punter $85 million over five years to bring over “The Pat McAfee Show” from FanDuel, where he previously had a $120 million four-year deal. His daily show will run on cable, YouTube, and the ESPN+ streaming service.
“The more traditional media outlets are trying to find ways of attracting that audience,” Wiacek said. “Bringing in the people that they’re familiar with is probably the way to go.”
Athletes are cutting out the middleman and owning their stories
Another growing trend in sports media is the ability for athletes to speak directly to their audiences through new digital channels. Current NBA players like Draymond Green and CJ McCollum host their own podcasts, as do former pros like McAfee, baseball hall-of-famer David Ortiz, and NBA veteran JJ Redick.
“In essence, you don’t need the middleman anymore,” Wiacek said. “That reliance on a traditional journalist isn’t really there anymore to tell their story. They can do it themselves.”
Leagues and teams have evolved their communications and storytelling in the digital age as well. Content from the source can be less organic because writers and content creators may be restricted from telling the whole story, said media consultant Tim Hanlon. But it’s an emerging area for job hunters, he said.
“Team-authored or league-authored content is growing and is being more invested in,” Hanlon said, “frankly, even hiring people from the gaps that are now coming as traditional media and journalistic endeavors get cut and are collapsing or getting smaller.”
Hanlon said team communications are essential for growing leagues like the NWSL that can’t wait around for classic media coverage to pour in, especially in local markets. He said MLS was an early player in establishing a league-wide media strategy, embracing its stories to fight backlash from “Euro snobs,” and he’s seeing other fledgling leagues in pickleball and cricket try to mimic the model.
“They’re not going to get the coverage from the traditional sports department, if there’s anybody there to pick up the phone anymore, anyway,” Hanlon said.
AI, tech could provide day-to-day coverage
Free and immediate scores and stats online mean most fans don’t wait for their morning paper to keep up with sports news. It takes “30 seconds to Google that,” Wiacek said.
The LA Times’ decision to cut its sports coverage indicates where the news media may go in the future, turning away from local beat coverage and adopting a magazine-style sports section.
“Given the resource issues, given the challenges on the margin to print media, it makes sense to potentially focus your resources in areas that are going to generate you revenue,” Wiacek said. “As sad as that is to traditionalists, I think that that’s an understanding of the way the wind’s blowing.”
The traditionalists are certainly sad. Some subscribers of the LA Times expressed their displeasure in letters to the paper, and its Sabbath-observing readers are mourning the loss of critical coverage of their favorite teams.
One possible solution could come from artificial intelligence. The Associated Press announced in 2016 it would use AI for its Minor League Baseball coverage, and it has used automated services for other sports stories.
Challenger said day-to-day sports writers are more vulnerable to being replaced by artificial intelligence.
“Technological advancement automates a lot of things that we needed to use humans to do before,” Hanlon said. “I fear that some of the soul of sports coverage, frankly, storytelling, will be hollowed out.”
Still, advancements in technology have allowed both athletes and members of the media to connect directly with their audiences in an instant and more personal setting and form their own brands online.
“You still have to create a reputation for yourself in some form or fashion,” Wiacek said. “Be that through a podcast, be that through a YouTube channel, be that through any other medium … Build your brand, think about what it is that you want to talk about, and become an expert in it.”
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