ESPN’s Raina Kelly is leaving her position as Andscape’s top editor, Front Office Sports reported.
On Friday, ESPN Executive Vice President Rosalyn Durant sent an internal memo announcing Kelly’s pending departure as editor-in-chief and vice president of the website dedicated to the intersection of Black culture and sports.
Mr. Kelly is open to taking a position at another company, the people said. ESPN has not yet announced her replacement.
Kelly was the third top leader in the seven-year history of ESPN’s Black-centric platform.
Former ESPN president John Skipper hired Jason Whitlock as the site’s first editor-in-chief in 2013.
In a podcast with Grantland founder Bill Simmons, Whitlock described the new site as “Black Grantland.” He later named it “The Undefeated”.
However, the website under development was plagued by years of delays. In the end, Skipper stripped Whitlock of the EIC title and bought out his contract. After that, Whitlock joined Fox Sports and now he is with TheBlaze.
Under the direction of new editor-in-chief Kevin Merida, The Undefeated finally launched in May 2016.
Kelly served as editor-in-chief of The Undefeated for five years. He succeeded Merida in the top job when she left in May 2021 to become editor-in-chief of the Los Angeles Times.
Under her leadership, “The Undefeated” was rebranded to “Andscape” in February 2022.
“It’s time to talk about black people and everything else,” Kelly said at the time. “It’s so much more than just sports and athletes.”
Recent years have not been kind to ESPN’s siled, standalone websites.
ESPN took over Nate Silver’s political site FiveThirtyEight in 2013, but moved it to ABC News, the Walt Disney Company’s sister network, in 2018.
Silver announced earlier this year that he was leaving after Disney’s layoffs had a “significant impact” on his site.
After clashing with ESPN management, ESPN did not renew Simmons’ contract in 2015.
ESPN shut down his “Grantland” site a year later. Simmons continued to recreate this location as “The Ringer.”
For now, Andscape is expected to continue as a multimedia platform, according to people familiar with the matter. Officials are expected to gather soon for a previously scheduled town hall meeting.
In recent years, the platform has expanded beyond news, including film and television units and book and music publishing groups.
Similarly, espnW has pivoted from its original mission to focus on women-themed live events and executive summits.
ESPN declined to comment Monday.