Stephen A. Smith gets honest about ESPN layoffs

At a time when layoffs are rampant in the sports media industry, Stephen A. Smith is looking to be compensated handsomely. That’s not a knock on Smith, who’s certainly set himself up for a payday upwards of eight figures per year; it’s just the reality of the very business he’s in.

It’s become the reality of his employer recently, too. ESPN let go of Robert Griffin III and Samantha Ponder a few weeks before the football season. While it certainly drew attention because of the timing, the network has maintained that moves were made because of “budgetary cuts.” Doing so at the end of the fiscal year, ESPN also shuffled around some of its executives in a reorganization measure , which saw several executives lose their jobs.

In any event, Smith , who’s become a spokesperson for the industry (like it or not) and the face of ESPN (along with Pat McAfee), was asked about layoffs during an hour-long panel with assembled media in Bristol, Connecticut, Wednesday.

And he sort of offered a defense as to why they’re happening and will keep happening.

“You see folks having trouble in some way, shape, form or fashion, even losing their jobs or whatever,” he said via The Washington Post’s Ben Strauss. “You got folks writing about how, ‘Hey, you know what? It’s so sad, it’s such a wrong thing to do.’ Why are they gone? Folks are not gone a lot of times because they lack talent … but they’re looking at numbers. And whoever’s not winning the numbers game, they’re going to make changes.”

Whether RG3 or Ponder were “winning the numbers game” could have influenced their departure from ESPN. Given the network’s focus on performance metrics and the competitive nature of the sports media industry, their contributions to the bottom line were likely a factor in the decision-making process.

While we can’t definitively say that Smith was referring to RG3 or Ponder specifically, the timing of his comments and his general tone suggests that he may have been alluding to ESPN’s recent layoffs and the ongoing challenges faced by sports media personalities in a competitive and data-driven industry.

But Smith won’t face those challenges himself anytime soon.

[ WaPo ]

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