ESPN shuts down Grantland, site founded by Bill Simmons

From a pure business standpoint, it is very understandable why ESPN shut down Grantland.

Simmons built such huge capital within the Disney-owned company he eventually gained oversight of his own offshoot website, which included a staff separate from ESPN.com. He had replaced Simmons as editor-in-chief with Chris Connelly, a veteran entertainment writer for the network.

“The site is beset by a climate of fear, a cycle of mistrust, and a belief amongst several that staff are “treated like children”, Miller wrote of the climate at Grantland just two weeks ago.

Effective immediately we are suspending the publication of Grantland. “This is probably going to sound like sour grapes, but so much of it has to do with the priorities around how you sell stuff, and we were a boutique site…” However, the individuals that were elevated by it will benefit from their association in the long run, and I think we’ll still be hearing from most, if not all, of them in a few shape or form. Today, though, is not that day, even as the peeved voiceless call out to ESPN management: “Yup, these were your readers”.

On Friday afternoon that commitment ended.

In a press release, ESPN said the site was suspended immediately, with no plans to revive it.

“These guys weren’t trying to make us succeed”, he added.

The site’s future had been an unsettled matter since May when the sports-media giant let go of Grantland founder/editor Bill Simmons, but the finality of Friday’s news turned media chatterers elegiac.

The network also said that the sorts of in-depth storytelling that found a home on Grantland will continue to exist on other ESPN platforms.

For those who appreciated quality writing and commentary-the site published everything from Molly Lambert’s brilliant Mad Men reviews to Zach Lowe’s sharp National Basketball Association analysis-the news hit hard. An overall lack of communication with management has been beyond frustrating for the staff. Many heard about Connelly’s appointment on their Twitter feeds-precisely where Simmons had learned of his dismissal.

ESPN said it will honor the contracts of all of Grantland’s writers.

Over the past months, Grantland writers, no doubt in fear of this day, have been searching for other jobs, including at Sports Illustrated. That meant he could demand a salary believed to be anywhere from $3 to $5 million annually and propel Skipper’s massive investment in a passion project named after sportswriter Grantland Rice. Simmons began a new role with HBO in October, and has hired away a number of former Grantlanders to join his project.

Simmons left ESPN in May when it made a decision to not renew his contract and took him off all platforms for the final five months of his contract. He is now vice president and editorial director of MTV News.