Pat McAfee has spoken out about the backlash following his massive ESPN contract while the network simultaneously executes layoffs.
ESPN laid off about 20 prominent on-air talents Friday, and a number of social media users connected the dots that McAfee just received a deal from the Worldwide Leader that The Post’s Andrew Marchand reported is worth around $85 million over five years.
Among the layoffs were Jeff Van Gundy, Jalen Rose, Steve Young, Suzy Kolber, Keyshawn Johnson, Max Kellerman and Todd McShay.
McAfee spoke out about the juxtaposition of his big-money deal coming at the same time ESPN has shed costs.
“I did a lot of reflecting about our show’s journey while I was getting murdered on the internet today (hell yeah).. all roads lead back to how honored I am to be the leader of such a talented group and how lucky I am to be a part of this team (a few missing from pics and a couple I couldn’t tag),” McAfee tweeted on Friday.
“We do our thing. We enjoy ourselves. And we never blink… Basement, box truck, world stoppage.. you name it.. the show rolls on.
“We’re very pumped to be joining ESPN and our goal is that ‘Mass exits’ are never a thing again.. we hope to help that.. obviously that’s a lofty goal but, that’s how I truly look at life… I wish we could’ve worked alongside a lot of the folks that got released today.
“Some absolute legends, that we all respect, in the sports media world were trending today for losing jobs. That sucks.. no matter how you slice it.”
It’s frankly going to be an uphill climb for McAfee to prevent future layoffs at ESPN.
The network was in about 100 million homes a decade ago, and now it’s in around 70-75 million; each home in the cable and satellite bundle pays over $10 a month for ESPN and ESPN2, regardless of whether anyone in the household watches ESPN.
Back-of-the-envelope math reveals this loss of subscribers adds up to several billion dollars in less revenue per year.
At the same time, rights fees for live sports are headed upwards, and ESPN’s parent company Disney’s foray into streaming has also been a costly endeavor.
Therefore, it’s hard to imagine any talent having a material impact on the factors affecting ESPN’s business.
Nevertheless, there’s also not exactly a linear relationship between current ESPN talent cuts and the eye-popping sums they are paying McAfee.
If ESPN can leverage McAfee’s considerable social media and YouTube presence to sell major sponsorships, which the network believes it can, then he could generate profits for the company, and thus theoretically help save a modest amount of jobs.
McAfee was a major driver of affiliate signups for FanDuel; if, for example, Fanatics, which is about to make a major push into sports gambling, were to become the presenting sponsor for McAfee’s show at ESPN, one could imagine a lucrative partnership.
That being said, even if McAfee generates tens of millions of dollars in profits for ESPN, it is a drop in the bucket compared to the pressure the network is facing with cord-cutting and escalating rights fees for the NFL, NBA, UFC, college football and other live sports.
“We’re gonna continue to control the things we can control,” McAfee continued in his tweet on Friday.
“[T]ry to do daily sports coverage in an entertaining and informative fashion.. and be thankful for all of the opportunities that have been earned thru a lot of hard work and commitment from the group of dudes I get to call coworkers. Have an incredible weekend. Cheers from all of us at #PMSLive.”