If/when the “non-binding agreement” between ESPN and the NFL becomes final and binding, the NFL will own 10 percent of ESPN. As recently explained, that will inevitably impact the manner in which ESPN covers the NFL.
For now, ESPN is telling its NFL reporters that it won’t.
“Of course I’m concerned, but I’ve had assurances from everyone who I work with that nothing will change,” ESPN’s Don Van Natta Jr. told John Ourand for the latest issue of his indispensable newsletter, The Varsity. “I am deep into an investigative project about the National Football League, and I believe it will be published just as it would’ve been published before the NFL became a part owner of ours.”
Maybe it will. Maybe it won’t.
Regardless, things have changed. The NFL and ESPN have gone from becoming arm’s-length business associates to joined-at-the-hip business partners. Even at only 10 percent, the NFL and ESPN have combined into one overlapping entity.
And while the NFL may tolerate some short-term rabble-rousing in order to avoid claims of being heavy-handed, it will make far more sense to see how this plays out over the long haul.
Indeed, it’s one thing to kill an “investigative project about the National Football League” when the reporter is already “deep” into it. That would be too obviously fishy. It’s another thing to exercise editorial discretion to not pursue that story in the first place. Which is precisely was could happen moving forward.
Yes, ESPN employs folks like Van Natta and Kalyn Kahler, who (unlike most NFL reporters) will risk a negative impact to their access in the name of getting to the truth. And those folks may continue to stubbornly pursue topics that will make the NFL uncomfortable.
They may even show up at the Commissioner’s Super Bowl press conference and ask him a pointed question. Twice.
Then, when their contracts are up, a business decision will be made to end the relationship.
In other words, Van Natta and/or Kahler and/or anyone else at ESPN who chooses to dig too deeply and too aggressively into the business of the NFL’s new business partner could get Jim Trotter’d.
