It’s a sad day in the sports media world. ESPN sports and pop-culture blog Grantland, which was founded back in 2011 by Bill Simmons, is being shut down by the network after months of turmoil.
via ESPN
After careful consideration, we have decided to direct our time and energy going forward to projects that we believe will have a broader and more significant impact across our enterprise. Grantland distinguished itself with quality writing, smart ideas, original thinking and fun. We are grateful to those who made it so. Bill Simmons was passionately committed to the site and proved to be an outstanding editor with a real eye for talent.
Thanks to all the other writers, editors and staff who worked very hard to create content with an identifiable sensibility and consistent intelligence and quality. We also extend our thanks to Chris Connelly who stepped in to help us maintain the site these past five months as he returns to his prior role. Despite this change, the legacy of smart long-form sports story-telling and innovative short form video content will continue, finding a home on many of our other ESPN platforms.
Editor-in-chief and founder of Grantland Bill Simmons was fired in May and many of the site’s prominent writers have left the site in recent months.
ESPN says it will honor the contracts of current Grantland writers and expects to move many of them to their other platforms.
Update: Here’s Bill Simmons’ response to ESPN shutting down Grantland.
I loved everyone I worked with at G and loved what we built. Watching good/kind/talented people get treated so callously = simply appalling.
— Bill Simmons (@BillSimmons) October 30, 2015
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