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The ESPN Catch-22, WaPo Rumbles & CNN Plot Points

News and notes on the biggest stories coursing through the media: Iger’s ESPN tea leaves, WaPo transformation, and a CNN digital counterfactual.

Jimmy Pitaro, the president-turned-recently-appointed chairman of ESPN
Jimmy Pitaro, the president-turned-recently-appointed chairman of ESPN. Photo: Meg Oliphant/Getty Images
Dylan Byers
February 16, 2023

Jimmy Pitaro, the recently-appointed chairman of ESPN, must be feeling a little bit of whiplash these days. When Pitaro was first promoted to run the network, in 2018, replacing the legendary and beloved John Skipper following his sudden exit, ESPN was viewed as core to the overall business—a linear cash cow and a key differentiator for Disney in the streaming wars. In the five years since, however, his parentco’s plans have ricocheted back and forth and back again, from public commitments about ESPN’s essential place in its portfolio to very real explorations of a sale or spin-off.