Just in case you had any doubts about what Skip Bayless feels he’s worth …
When Skip Bayless departed from ESPN, there wasn’t a lot of love lost from either side. Part of the issue, as it often is, was related to money. ESPN reportedly offered Bayless around $4 million to stay, while Fox Sports raised eyebrows by giving him much more than that to jump ship.
The debate about whether the king of the hot take was worth it will likely rage on indefinitely. His Fox Sports show with Shannon Sharpe, Undisputed, isn’t exactly killing it in the ratings, but then that could be said of sports talk in general in 2016.
Yet if there’s one person who is confident he’s worth every penny, that would be Bayless himself. In fact according to SI reporter Ricahrd Deitsch, he says he was underpaid while at ESPN:
"By what I was giving them, I was poorly paid. I was the most underpaid on-air talent at ESPN for 12 years."
— Richard Deitsch (@richarddeitsch) September 22, 2016
-@RealSkipBayless to @pkafka
The key phrase here would seem to be, “by what I was giving them,” considering Bayless was most certainly not hitting up fellow ESPN employees for lunch money. He may not have been delivering eyeballs, but First Take was frequently a topic of general internet buzz, at the very least, when he and Stephen A. Smith were teamed up.
Related Story: More Bayless thoughts on ESPN management
Bayless has his fans, but he’s got tons of vocal critics as well. It’s even fair to say that divisiveness among sports fans is part of his shtick. Did ESPN fail to value that enough? Time will tell, but at least we know where he stands on this issue, no hot take necessary.