re: Right when you thought ESPN couldn't get any worse

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Zucker is a weird choice. He has a track record of getting an initial bump when he takes over, but ultimately leaving networks in worse shape than he found them.

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He’s arguably one of the worst television execs in history.

His tenure at NBC was damn near catastrophic, highlighted by him spearheading the Tonight Show frick up with Conan in 2010 and NBC essentially ceasing to be relevant in prime time.

He then took over what used to be a respected news network in CNN and turned it into a national punchline, and quite literally half the country doesn’t even believe what CNN reports anymore.

This is a terrible hire for a company at a pivotal crossroads in its history and with a murky future on the horizon if it isn’t strategic in how it positions itself in the next few years.

Maureen Dowd wrote a piece on him during the 2010 Tonight Show debacle, and this was a particularly damning passage:

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“Zucker is a case study in the most destructive media executive ever to exist,” said a honcho at another network. “You’d have to tell me who else has taken a once-great network and literally destroyed it.”

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