ESPN's Burke Magnus and Rosalyn Durant are both seen as big winners in the reorganizationESPN
A major reorg was announced at ESPN today with Burke Magnus taking on an big new role as president of content and seemingly solidifying his place as number two to ESPN Chair Jimmy Pitaro. Magnus moves from his role overseeing the company’s programming relationships to heading up all studio shows, live events, newsgathering, investigative journalism, original content/ESPN Films, the Talent Office, audio, digital and social media. Head of Event & Studio Production Stephanie Druley, Head of NBA and Studio Production David Roberts and Exec Editor & Head of Event & Studio Production Norby Williamson all will report to Magnus. Previously, Druley, Roberts and Williamson reported to Pitaro. Magnus’ other direct reports will include Brian Lockhart and Kaitee Daley.
ON THE COMEBACK: Another big part of the reorg involves Rosalyn Durant, who returns to ESPN to take over Magnus’ old role overseeing programming and rights acquisitions, plus andscape and espnW. As EVP/Programming & Acquisitions, Durant will handle league relationships for ESPN. She will relocate to Bristol and split her time between Bristol and Charlotte. This move comes weeks after Disney boss Bob Iger made ESPN one of three pillars and had everyone working on sports unified under ESPN. As a result, Pitaro ended up with many more people reporting to him and looked to streamline his number of direct reports.
PITARO'S MEMO: Head of Content Operations & Creative Surround Tina Thornton expands her role to oversee ESPN’s Production Operations group. As a result, the Synergy team will move from Thornton to Laura Gentile’s marketing team. Pitaro in his memo to employees wrote, “Burke, Rosalyn, Tina, and Laura will report to me, as will Mark Walker, Head of Sports Business Development & Innovation, Rob King, Executive Editor-In-Chief, Special Projects, and Chara-Lynn Aguiar, SVP, ESPN Strategy & Office of the Chairman. Legal, HR, Communications and Finance will continue to report to both corporate and to me at this time, and, as mentioned previously, Technology, Affiliate Sales, Ad Sales, and our international leads will report to me, Dana Walden, and Alan Bergman.”
