When The Walt Disney Company ousted CEO Bob Chapek in November and returned Bob Iger to his old post, the main questions in sports swirled around ESPN. Would Iger seek to sell ESPN? Would he slow down buying sports rights, or dismantle ESPN the TV network and move it all to streaming on ESPN+?
Iger began to answer some of those questions Wednesday in his first earnings call with analysts since his return. In his absence between CEO stints, some investors grew more vocal in demands for Disney to sell ESPN. One Wall Street firm predicted an ESPN sale this year.
Iger threw cold water on that idea, even though a new reorganization he unveiled on the call includes ESPN getting stripped out of Disney’s media and entertainment group. The sports network will operate in its own standalone silo within the larger entertainment conglomerate. It is now one of three divisions — the others are theme parks, and media and entertainment.
“We were fairly certain when we created this structure and broke ESPN out on its own, that it would lead to questions like this,” he said of one such query from J.P. Morgan analyst Philip Cusick about whether ESPN standing alone within the company meant it was being primed for a sale. “We did not do it for that purpose. Actually, ESPN is a…
