Bill
Simmons is a guy who likes to stir up controversy to make stories interesting
and sometimes doesn’t care what the consequences are. Knowing that he recently
had a very public break up with ESPN he will take every shot he can at “The
Mother Ship”. He was tweeted by @ParrishWalton on twitter and he said, “What
are the lessons @BillSimmons learned from running Grantland from a business
perspective?” Bill Simmons responded with a tweet back saying, “Don’t do it with
ESPN”. ESPN has had a lot trouble running their affiliated websites including
“The Undefeated” which eventually saw Jason Whitlock part ways with the
company. Maybe they need to focus more on their TV content than worrying about
what their digital content is looking like. You saw guys like: Jason Whitlock,
Keith Olbermann and Colin Cowherd leave the company because the company is
going downhill and they weren’t allowed to give their full opinions because of
the TV rights deals and relationships ESPN has. You can now add Bill Simmons to
the list of guys that left ESPN because the two sides couldn’t agree on letting
their opinions be heard. In my opinion I think Bill Simmons did himself in by
talking about Roger Goodell’s handling of the Ray Rice incident on, “The Dan
Patrick Show”. Simmons said, “I’ll go further than
you. I think it’s pathetic. He has handled so many things so badly — Roger
Goodell — that it’s reached a point now where you have something like
this, where it took four months to release the report, and he knew
everything that was in it. He knows the results before the report is
released to the public, and yet doesn’t have the testicular fortitude to do
anything until he gauges the public reaction.” I understand that ESPN has a major
contract with the NFL for Monday Night Football but, as a reporter/journalist
you have to be able to give your opinion and being censored just makes it sound
dumb. It is dumb because you are saying what the company wants you to say… not
what you think is going to happen
Since the
break up, Bill Simmons has signed a huge multiyear deal with HBO to produce
content for all their platforms, as well as continuing his podcast which he did
over at Grantland. I guarantee you he has way more freedom to do what he wants
at HBO and his opinions won’t be as censored as they were over at ESPN. Now
that his podcast has been up and running he is creating a new site for his
digital content and hopefully this site won’t get run into the ground like
Grantland did. His new site is called, “The Ringer” and it will be interesting
to see how the site is run differently. Just be prepared to see a lot of
stories on Tom Brady and deflated footballs since he seems to hold a bias
towards Boston sports. I like sports reporters/journalists who get away from
being censored and give their own opinions. You should be able to speak up
regardless of what deals your company has. If you’re not going to be completely
honest with your audience, then you might as well not speak to the audience at
all. I give credit to Nate Scott for reporting on this story to show that
sometimes you have to keep looking for the right opportunities until you find
the one that allows you to speak your opinions and not be censored.
If you would like to read more in-depth on this story check
out the link to his story:
Check out my podcast, “Behind The Mic with Nick Morgasen” on
I-Tunes and Youtube as I’ve interviewed many famous people including: Adam
Carolla, Cesar Millan, Tommy James, Jackie Mason and others!!!!
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