Sports Illustrated and your local newspaper probably have a lot in common: Both have been damaged and maybe even killed off not because nobody wanted to read them but because the money people came in with a knife.
I’m not a sports fan, but it sucks any time a quality publication like Sports Illustrated dies or is badly damaged because it’s purchased by an entity that simply sucks money from it.
About 2,500 U.S. newspapers have closed since 2005, the New York Times reports. Each closed newspaper means a damaged community.
Sports Illustrated suffers from the same problem as many local papers.
New York Magazine explains what happened in Greed Killed Sports Illustrated. It’s a complicated and evolving story I encourage you to read. As the headline suggests, it blames greed and debt — which is why I say Sports Illustrated and thousands of dead and dying newspapers all suffered from the same disease.
If your community no longer has a daily newspaper — or if it still has one but just barely — here is a simplified explanation: A big fish borrowed money to purchase a lot of little fish and then had to squeeze all those little fish in order to make payments on the loan.
One common story is that of a little fish that was managing OK in its own small pond, but could no longer keep afloat when its new owners pulled money from its budget to help pay for the loan used to purchase it.
Suddenly, journalists are hassled about the most insignificant costs — we’re talking notebooks and pens — as executives enjoy lavish compensation. Eye-popping bonuses go to the top executives, who are tasked with keeping all the journalists actually doing the work on salaries too low to cover rent.
Many such publications suffer death from a thousand cuts.
If you’re the one trying to keep the publication alive, it feels like far more than a thousand. But eventually, you are going to bleed to death no matter how many bandages you apply.
A couple of generations ago, family-owned newspapers were the norm. Such papers only had to support operations and generate a profit for the family that had owned them for generations. Many of these families made a literal fortune when they sold out to larger media companies.
The progression usually went like this: The new entity would purchase a publication and announce it was proud to own a piece of history and had no plans to change much. And then the new owner would institute every imaginable cost-cutting measure. You’d see multiple rounds of layoffs and harsh cuts would hit every line item except executive pay.
Soon, there would be nobody left to provide meaningful news coverage. If the publication had a landmark building worth some money, the new owners would sell it, even if the newspaper had operated there for a hundred years. First, one day of publication would be dropped, and then another. The publication might eventually progress to full-on digital, and, in many cases, the eventual closure.
I spent much of my career in community journalism.
So I lived this in real time.
When I was laid off in 2015, I was the editor of my local daily newspaper. Before my time, it was owned by the locally prominent McNaughton family. (If you’re a history buff, you might know who John T. McNaughton was.)
After the family sold the paper, it ended up in the hands of various media conglomerates, none of which did the paper any good from my perspective. The paper still exists, but has no local office and almost no local news. Despite still being called a daily, it publishes only four days per week. I glance away when I see a copy at the supermarket; it hurts my heart to see it this way. I loved it, you see.
This story has been repeated at thousands of papers across the country, resulting in news deserts. I have very little idea what is going on in my community these days. I used to know everything that was going on — and so did my readers.
People still want local news and plenty of journalists still want to provide it. Starting a publication is notoriously difficult; keeping an established one going works much better. Squeezing enough money out of a publication to cover the cost of purchasing it is either impossible or very close to it.
The Sports Illustrated brand is still worth something.
I am sure it will continue on in some fashion for a while. There will no doubt be a swimsuit edition if nothing else. Will it draw great sports journalists? Will good work be done there? Will it still be an iconic brand for the next generation?
I doubt that very much.