In September of 2015, Bill Simmons will no longer be employed by ESPN.
Bill Simmon , the most influential sports media figure in the country, and his employer, the self-proclaimed “worldwide leader in sports,” will not be renewing their contract.
This should get interesting.
In his time at ESPN, Simmons wrote two books (the second of which debuted at number one on the New York Times Best Seller List), launched the network’s most popular podcast, conceived the Emmy-winning 30 for 30 documentaries series (which has published 93 installments since 2007), and launched the website Grantland.com.
Simmons has been successful for two reasons: he’s wicked smart and he embraces conflict.
Here’s some of what ESPN’s president John Skipper had to say about the break:
“I decided today that we are not going to renew Bill Simmons’ contract. We have been in negotiations and it was clear it was time to move on..It was about more than money”
ESPN and Simmons have a well-documented series of disagreements, several of which resulted in suspensions for Simmons, so this is not entirely shocking.
What’s most intriguing is the question of what Simmons will do after he leave’s ESPN in September 2015. The guy will likely get huge offers from ESPN’s competitors, including FOX Sports and NBC Sports, and his innate ability to relate pop culture and sports gives him a level of crossover appeal possessed by no one else in the industry.
ESPN will most likely continue to monopolize sports media in the United States, but the prospect of Simmons joining another network could prove to be the most legitimate threat to its reign in decades.