Last week news broke that Michelle Beadle would not be returning to ESPN’s NBA Countdown this year, adding another chapter to an already complicated relationship between the network and its one-time star.
Rachel Nichols will take over for Beadle on Countdown, with Maria Taylor filling in when she can.
At the start of the decade, Beadle was one of the rising stars of the industry. The San Antonio native came up through the ranks via the YES Network covering the Nets before showcasing her personality on the Michael Kay Show for ESPN New York. She emerged on the national scene when she teamed up with Colin Cowherd on SportsNation in 2009, a pivotal program for ESPN at the time due to it’s embrace of social media interaction and trending viral videos – sports related or otherwise.
In 2012, Beadle left ESPN to work for NBC covering sports and appearing regularly on Access Hollywood. It was a marriage that didn’t last long.
Less than two years after her departure, John Skipper welcomed Beadle back to ESPN with a contract worth $5 million annually.
From here, as outlined in a recent New York Post article by Andrew Marchand, things get interesting. It’s not clear how both sides landed on the $5 million number, as Beadle was just let out of her NBC contract and it didn’t seem like any other outlets were bidding on her services. Either way, it appeared Beadle was a favorite of Skipper and she had a home with the company as long as he was in charge. Beadle went back to SportsNation duties, helped out with NBA studio coverage and eventually launched Beadlemania – a podcast under the Grantland umbrella.
Beadle’s role with ESPN became increasingly ambiguous as soon as Skipper resigned in 2017. She was lured to New York to help launch Get Up! in early 2018 but was moved off the show relatively quickly after saying on air that she was no longer going to watch NFL games. She’s been a mainstay on NBA Countdown since 2016, and now with that show in her rear view mirror, it’s not likely Beadle will find another landing spot with ESPN, a company that still owes her $5 million for the next 1-2 years.
Marchand goes on to speculate Jimmy Pitaro made the move as part of his larger vision for ESPN; to get the network back to 24/7 news and information with less “Skipper All-Stars” driving content themselves.