John Skipper’s resignation as president of ESPN on Monday morning was a shocking announcement in the sports media world. Skipper, who had been at ESPN since 1997 and served as president since 2012, announced he was battling a substance abuse problem and would be stepping down, effective immediately.
The decision was not something that was known internally to be coming and, because of that, there were a number of ESPN employees as well as former employees that took to social media to react to the news in shock and wish Skipper the best as he tries to battle through his addiction.
The most emotional and heartfelt of those responses came from Dan Le Batard, who was on air on ESPN Radio and ESPNU when the email of Skipper’s resignation came through. Le Batard read through the email, fighting back tears, and then went on to explain why he was so emotional about Skipper leaving in what is one of the more honest moments of sports radio you will see.
Le Batard notes that he’s scared for Skipper, saying he just wants to know if he’s OK, and explains that Skipper is the reason he came to ESPN.
“I didn’t want to work for ESPN,” Le Batard said. “I wanted to work for him.”
The segment is incredibly emotional and, in classic Le Batard Show fashion, even ends with some laughs as Stugotz goes directly into the ad read for the segment and Dan questions why he can’t get through this emotional moment without it being sponsored. While the ending is quite funny, the first three-plus minutes shows just how important Skipper was to so many ESPN staffers. Le Batard notes, as many others have, that he was always hoping to push forward voices of minorities at ESPN and help elevate them to bigger platforms, whether it be women or people of different races and ethnicities.
