NYT Remembers Sports Exists

The NY Times is a fantastic publication, however if you're a sports fan it's not a place to go. The surprising hit since 2016 has been The Athletic. The Athletic is an online sports-focused site with a dedicated reporter for every North American team. For teams that have traditionally been under-covered or in markets where local newspapers have gone out of business, The Athletic has been a breath of fresh air. Now, it'll become part of the New York Times for a cool $550 million.

The deal brings The Times, which has more than eight million total subscriptions, quickly closer to its goal of having 10 million subscriptions by 2025, while also offering its audience more in-depth coverage of the more than 200 professional teams in North America, Britain and Europe that are closely followed by The Athletic’s journalists.

NY Times

For me, the most interesting part of this news is trying to find out how many subscribers The Athletic has. I'm one of them, but I only know one other person who pays for the site and I know a lot more than one sports fan. For me, the coverage of the Islanders has been stellar. All was not rosy for this great reporting though.

It's a huge victory for The Athletic, which had been shopping a deal for months. The subscription-based sports media company was under pressure to sell in light of how much cash it's lost over the past two years.

Axios

It will be interesting to see how NYT incorporates The Athletic into their subscription model. We know they did this not too long ago with Wirecutter, so it's possible they may follow a similar model.