Bill Simmons announces new website ‘The Ringer’
Bill Simmons during the Grantland Basketball Hour on ESPN on Oct. 23, 2014. Credit: ESPN Images/Kohjiro Kinno
Bill Simmons announced on Wednesday that his new digital home will be called “The Ringer” and premiere later in 2016, most likely within the next several months after beginning in March as an emailed newsletter.
Simmons, formerly one of ESPN’s most visible personalities, left the network last year and announced that HBO would be his new television home, with a show expected to premiere later this year.
But he made it clear at the time he would have a separate home for his written work, one that is expected to include both sports and pop culture, much like his old “Grantland” site did under the ESPN umbrella.
ESPN shut down “Grantland” late last year, and many of its alumni will join Simmons at “The Ringer.”
When a Twitter follower asked Simmons Wednesday morning what lessons he learned from running “Grantland” from a business perspective, he responded, “Don’t do it with ESPN.”
Neil Best first worked at Newsday in 1982, returned in 1985 after a detour to Alaska and has been here since, specializing in high schools, college basketball, the NFL and most recently sports media and business.
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