At ESPN, some are rewarded for their loyalty and others are laid off; Karl Ravech was both.
Longtime ESPN host and play-by-play broadcaster Karl Ravech has been laid off from the company, Andrew Marchand of The Athletic reported Tuesday, ending a 33-year tenure that began in 1993. Ravech — who had not been informed of the news when Marchand reached him Tuesday morning — was most associated with Major League Baseball, first as the network’s main studio host starting in 1995 and then as the voice of “Sunday Night Baseball” starting in 2022.
Ravech remained an MLB play-by-play voice this season, the first of a new ESPN rights deal that does not include Sunday night games. He was on the air Monday night calling Dodgers-Phillies, making him one of at least two ESPN employees who appeared on-air Monday and then were subsequently laid off, along with Ryan Clark.
In addition to Major League Baseball, Ravech had been the lead voice of ESPN’s college baseball coverage, including the Men’s College World Series. Mike Monaco, who called the second game of Monday’s ESPN MLB doubleheader, would seem a likely contender to replace Ravech on at least college games.
Ravech was also the main Little League baseball voice for ESPN — leaving an opening on that event right before it begins — and worked occasional college basketball games.
It should be noted that Ravech was not regarded as the best baseball voice on ESPN’s staff. It may be the case that Ravech’s apparent reward for decades of work stewarding “Baseball Tonight” — becoming the network’s lead baseball play-by-play voice above more-suited talent — is what ultimately made him more expendable.
Though he stopped regularly anchoring “SportsCenter” years ago, Ravech becomes just the latest longtime anchor to depart ESPN in recent years. Linda Cohn left the show, and ESPN, last month. Stan Verrett did the same last year, preceded by Neil Everett, John Anderson and Kenny Mayne.
He was not the only longtime “SportsCenter” anchor laid off Tuesday, as David Lloyd was also among the cuts, per Michael McCarthy and Ryan Glasspiegel of Front Office Sports. Lloyd had been with ESPN since 1997 and last month made regular fill-in appearances on the 6 PM ET edition.
Per the same Front Office Sports report, ESPN is also laying off NFL injury analyst Stephania Bell.
While the talent layoffs will generate the most headlines due to their high profile nature, the cuts have largely focused on behind-the-scenes staffers, with the main focus being reducing overlap between ESPN and NFL Network. In a memo obtained by Sports Media Watch, ESPN president Jimmy Pitaro said that “most of the job impacts are tied to the [NFL Network] acquisition.”
The majority of the talent layoffs have already been publicized, Sports Media Watch has learned.
