Bill Simmons, ESPN, and the New Writing Economy

May 11th, 2015 | 5 min read

It's perhaps fitting, given the shape of his career, that the news of ESPN's decision to fire Bill Simmons could manage to be both a surprise and completely predictable. (Yes, I know he wasn't technically fired but when your boss tells the nation's largest paper he isn't renewing your contract without first telling you then we're talking about something more than an amicable parting of ways.) Simmons, of course, is one of the pioneers of online writing, the man who did for sports writing what Andrew Sullivan and Ezra Klein have done for political blogging.

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Jake Meador

Jake Meador is the editor-in-chief of Mere Orthodoxy. He is a 2010 graduate of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln where he studied English and History. He lives in Lincoln, NE with his wife Joie, their daughter Davy Joy, and sons Wendell, Austin, and Ambrose. Jake's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Commonweal, Christianity Today, Fare Forward, the University Bookman, Books & Culture, First Things, National Review, Front Porch Republic, and The Run of Play and he has written or contributed to several books, including "In Search of the Common Good," "What Are Christians For?" (both with InterVarsity Press), "A Protestant Christendom?" (with Davenant Press), and "Telling the Stories Right" (with the Front Porch Republic Press).

Topics:

the vocation of writing

Writing

Bill Simmons, ESPN, and the New Writing Economy

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