On Thursday, Ed Werder announced his departure from ESPN after 26 years as an NFL reporter at the network. On Friday, Peter King voiced his disapproval.
In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Werder made clear that although his time with the worldwide leader was coming to a close, he was committed to continuing to work in the industry covering football. In his statement, Werder said that he will “immediately begin considering other opportunities to continue my work covering the NFL.”
Reading between the lines, ESPN felt Werder’s services were no longer needed and either let him go or decided not to offer him a new contract.
That’s where King stepped in. The recently retired longtime NFL scribe and champion of journalism and reporting clearly took issue with the move from ESPN’s point of view, arguing that ESPN was “marginalizing” Werder and wondering aloud if the network no longer cares about reporting.
ESPN’s internal tug-of-war between sports journalism and sports entertainment (not the pro wrestling kind, the Stephen A. Smith kind) has always been a talking point at the network. ESPN is big enough, powerful enough, rich enough, and influential enough to do the best of both. But in recent years, the scales have certainly been tilted towards entertainment with millions splashed on Smith, Pat McAfee and others while shows like Outside the Lines have been canceled entirely.
That’s not to say ESPN doesn’t do stellar reporting anymore – check Jeff Darlington at the PGA Championship. But when most people think of ESPN these days, they’re not going to think about Ed Werder doing straight-down-the-middle reporting, they’ll think of Stephen A. giving his Knicks a pep talk with Spike Lee.