SBNation

''SB Nation'' (an abbreviation for their full name ''SportsBlogs Nation'') is a sports blogging network owned by Vox Media. It was co-founded by Tyler Blezinski, Markos Moulitsas, and Jerome Armstrong in 2003. The blog from which the network formed was started by Bleszinski as ''Athletics Nation'' in 2003, and focused solely on the Oakland Athletics. It later expanded to cover sports franchises on a national scale, including all Major League Baseball, National Basketball Association, and National Football League teams, as well as college teams, mixed martial arts and professional wrestling, and more, totaling over 300 community sites at its peak. The coverage style of SB Nation’s communities have an emphasis on covering sports from the perspective of fans.

In 2011, the network expanded into technology content with ''The Verge'', leading to the parent company Sports Blogs Inc. being rebranded as Vox Media. ''SB Nation'' operates from Vox Media's offices in New York City and Washington, D.C.

Corporate affairs and business model

From 2003 to 2011, the sports blog network ''SB Nation'' (originally known as ''SportsBlogs Nation'') operated under the parent company SportsBlogs Inc., which was headquartered in Washington, D.C. Since Sports Blogs was rebranded as Vox Media, the network has also operated from the digital media company's offices in Manhattan. Vox Media's chief executive officer, Jim Bankoff, has served as ''SB Nation'' CEO since 2009.

SB Nation's community sites cover specific sports, individual teams, or colleges athletics programs. They are staffed by a combination of full-time employees and part-time contractors paid through a monthly stipends or unpaid. These contributors cover game previews and recaps, analysis, breaking news, and more. Some have even produced regular podcast episodes. The sites encourage their readers to contribute to discussions on the sites. The network generates revenue through advertising.

History

Founding and growth

''SB Nation'' was co-founded by friends Tyler Bleszinski and Markos Moulitsas in 2003. The single blog from which the network formed was launched by Bleszinski as ''Athletics Nation'' in July 2003, and covered only the Oakland Athletics baseball team. ''Athletics Nation'' quickly became Blogads's second largest website, following Daily Kos, where Moulitsas served as an editor. Following the blog network's creation, six additional writers were hired to join Bleszinski in creating content, and Daily Kos' platform was implemented to encourage online community growth. Established bloggers were selected to contribute articles, and sports fans could leave comments. After sites were created for all Major League Baseball (MLB), National Basketball Association (NBA), National Football League (NFL), and National Hockey League (NHL) franchises, along with some college and other teams, Bleszinski focused on company growth and making money.

In 2008, ''SB Nation'' raised $5 million in a Series A round of financing with Accel Partners, Allen & Company, and Ted Leonsis contributing. Jim Bankoff, who was advising the company during the venture round, became ''SB Nation'' CEO in January 2009. The network had approximately 1 million unique users, 5 million unique users, and nearly 185 blogs by February. The NHL sanctioned and began linking to ''SB Nation'' content on its official website in April, when the network was averaging 5 million unique monthly visitors across nearly 200 sites. In July, Comcast's venture capital branch, Comcast Interactive Capital, spearheaded a nearly $8 million second round of financing. In September 2009, ''SB Nation'' was re-launched to serve as a nationally focused portal for the network's blogs. Revenue generated by the network increased by four times in 2009.

In 2010, the network launched 20 regional sites, bringing the total number of sites to nearly 275. ''SB Nation'' had 31 full-time employees and was receiving 40 million monthly page views by approximately 8 million unique users, as of mid 2010. Comcast SportsNet and ''SB Nation'' agreed to a content sharing partnership in shared markets in June 2010. In July 2010, SB Nation announced it had acquired The Sporting Blog from ''Sporting News'' and would merge it with its main website. In November, Khosla Ventures led a third round of funding for ''SB Nation,'' bringing the company's total funding to approximately $23 million.

''SB Nation'' acquired the blog networks FanTake and The Offside in March 2011, expanding its coverage of college sports and soccer, respectively. The network hired several Engadget employees to launch its first major expansion outside sports.

Formation of Vox Media

''SB Nation'' parent company, SportsBlogs Inc., rebranded as Vox Media in October 2011 and ''The Verge'' launched in November 2011. In late 2011, MMAFighting.com was integrated into SB Nation after Vox Media acquired the mixed martial arts site from AOL. MMA Fighting produces ''The MMA Hour'' and ''The MMA Beat'', which continue to stream on ''SB Nation'' and social media outlets, as of 2017.

In September 2012, ''SB Nation'' introduced a major redesign codenamed "SB United", which introduced a new "magazine-style" layout with a larger focus on long-form content and digital media, and redesigned logos for each of the network's approximately 300 blogs. The redesign was overseen by Spencer Hall, the site's first editorial director.

The LGBT sports website '' Outsports'' was acquired by Vox Media and integrated into ''SB Nation'' in March 2013. The site's founders retained editorial control, and the purchase marked the first time a major sports media company acquired an LGBT-focused website. ''SB Nation'' was averaging approximately 50 million unique visitors by mid 2013, and had approximately 800 contributing bloggers by the end of the year. Bleszinski left the company at the end of 2015.

Holtzclaw controversy

In February 2016, the site published a lengthy profile of Daniel Holtzclaw, a former police officer convicted of multiple accounts of rape and other charges, focusing on his college football career. The piece, which was seen as sympathetic to Holtzclaw, was heavily criticized and was taken down within hours of publication. ''SB Nation'' editorial director Spencer Hall apologized for "a complete breakdown" of ''SB Nation'' editorial process, and described the story and its publication as a "complete failure" of site standards. ''SB Nation'' subsequently cut ties with the story's author, freelance journalist Jeff Arnold, and put its longform program on hiatus pending a peer review of the editorial process that led to the Holtzclaw piece being published. The head of the longform program, veteran sportswriter Glenn Stout, was suspended and later fired.

In May 2016, Vox Media published the results of the peer review. It found that the longform program was isolated from the rest of ''SB Nation'' in a way that made it impossible for stories to be properly vetted. It also harshly criticized ''SB Nation'' for not giving individual editors the authority to review stories about sensitive topics. At the time, sensitive stories were reviewed by the newsroom's two most senior women, senior editor Elena Bergeron and senior content producer Sarah Kogod. The reviewers found that this practice made it appear that an individual editor did not have the responsibility to "care to the fullest extent about matters of ethics, integrity, and accuracy." It also raised concerns about the lack of diversity in the newsroom. Based on the review, ''SB Nation'' permanently shelved the longform program, replacing it with a features program. ''SB Nation'' also announced it would take steps to diversify its newsroom. In a statement, ''SB Nation'' said that the Holtzclaw situation revealed that "an organization cannot afford to wait to be diverse, particularly if that organization is one that wants to tell stories."

Partnership with the Ringer

In May 2017, the sports and culture website '' The Ringer'' transferred its publishing platform from Medium to Vox Media's Chorus platform. The site's founder, Bill Simmons, retained ownership and editorial control. ''The Ringer'' parent company, Bill Simmons Media Group, and Vox Media agreed to share revenue generated by advertisements sold by Vox Media. Vox Media began sharing audience traffic between ''SB Nation'' and ''The Ringer''. In August, the site underwent a revamp to match other SB Nation websites.

''The Ringer'', and its podcast network, were purchased by Spotify in 2020.

Accusations of exploitation

In the wake of the Holtzclaw controversy, Elena Bergeron was named ''SB Nation'' first editor-in-chief in March 2017. In August, Deadspin published a report detailing SB Nation's reliance on underpaid and unpaid labor from site managers and contributors. Bergeron was quoted in the story, stating that it was "company policy that everybody who contributes for a Vox Media property gets paid." Several site managers who were interviewed for the same story were not aware of this policy.

In September 2017, a former site manager filed a collective action lawsuit against Vox Media contending that they were a misclassified employee. Three separate lawsuits were eventually condensed into one. The company ultimately agreed to pay $4 million to 450 writers and site managers to settle the case in August 2020.

Nine months after the initial Deadspin report, SB Nation had hired additional staff to provide greater support to team sites, increased the budgets for some sites, converted several part-time employees to full-time status, and added greater restrictions on the use of unpaid contributors.

In November 2017, Vox Media staff announced it was forming a labor union in association with Writers Guild of America, East. Though full-time SB Nation staff members were included, part-time bloggers and site managers were not. Vox Media Union ratified its first contract in June 2019.

Layoffs and site closures

In February 2018, Vox Media laid off 50 employees, including some members of the ''SB Nation'' social video team. A number of part-time copy editors and news writers were also cut.

In February 2019, it was announced that Bergeron would step down from her role as editor-in-chief, remaining until a replacement was hired. In July, Vox announced it would hire a senior vice president to oversee SB Nation. It wasn't until 16 months later, in October 2020, that the company finally promoted Jermaine Spradley to SVP.

In August 2019, after closing its national college football blog ''Every Day Should Be Saturday'' (which joined the platform in 2010 after originally being established in 2005 as an independent website), ''SB Nation'' announced a new college football vertical known as ''Banner Society'', which will aim to " keep expanding, warping, and sharpening the conversation around college football in all its bizarre, corrupt, colorful elements", and "find new and different ways to connect with our audience directly, all over the internet". In September, SB Nation launched DK Network, a dedicated sports gambling website in conjunction with DraftKings.

In December 2019, Vox Media announced that in order to comply with California Assembly Bill 5, ''SB Nation'' would "end our contracts with most contractors at California brands" over the coming months, and transfer their roles to a new group of employees. The company stated that this would be an extension of investments that have seen more full-time employees working for the network's largest sites, and that former contractors would be able to contribute as unpaid "community insiders".

On April 17, 2020, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Vox Media announced it would furlough 9% of its workforce starting May 1, 2020, including ''SB Nation.'' By June, a number of writers and editors from Banner Society left the company through buyouts. In July, the company laid off 6% of the company, including many of those who had already been furloughed. An internal memo mentioned that Vox was only bringing back 30% of its furloughed workers. In September 2022, the company shut down a number of sites focused on college sports.

In January 2023, Vox announced another round of layoffs, affecting 7% of its staff. The cuts hit SB Nation hard, with a majority of the company's hockey and soccer sites becoming unaffiliated or being shut down completely. Women's ice hockey site The Ice Garden became an independent site with more financial backing than SB Nation had been providing. MMA site Bloody Elbow was sold to its original founder in March. In April, Sacramento Kings site Sactown Royalty was sold off to its original founder and Chicago Bulls site BlogABull moved to Substack in April. By August, Sounder at Heart, one of only two soccer sites to remain, left SB Nation and transitioned to a reader-supported model.

Despite these cuts, SB Nation also expanded. It launched a new golf website in May and its first paid newsletters, focusing on the Detroit Lions and Kansas City Chiefs in August.

Spradley, who had been serving as publisher since March 2022, left the company in January 2024. In March, Vox Media divested ''Outsports'' to LGBT-oriented publisher Q Digital, with the site's co-founders receiving an equity stake in the company. In April 2024, Vox Media shut down the website's podcast network.

Multimedia content

In May 2016, ''SB Nation'' created an online video series for NBC Sports around '' NBC Sunday Night Football''. The network expanded into radio programming in mid-2016 through a partnership with Gow Media. ''SB Nation'' sold its first original television program, ''Foul Play'', to Verizon Communications go90, in September. The network was averaging approximately 70 million unique monthly visitors at this time. ''Foul Play'' premiered in May 2018.

In July 2017, SB Nation published '' 17776'', serialized speculative fiction multimedia narrative by Jon Bois. A sequel, called ''20020'', was published in 2020.

In January 2018, ''SB Nation'' and ''Eater'' aired an online three-episode celebrity cooking competition series sponsored by PepsiCo. The show featured National Football League players Greg Jennings, Rashad Jennings, and Nick Mangold as competitors, as well as chefs Anne Burrell and Josh Capon.

In 2018, SB Nation launched its podcast network, beginning with its NFL team sites and expanding to cover every major sports team. In October, SB Nation launched its first storytelling podcast, “It Seemed Smart,” a six-part series hosted by Spencer Hall.

SB Nation also maintains a YouTube channel which publishes regular web series by a variety of online hosts and content editors including Jon Bois, Will Buikema, Ryan Simmons, Seth Rosenthal, Kofie Yeboah, Mike Imhoff, Clara Morris and many others. In August 2020, SB Nation's YouTube channel was renamed to Secret Base.

The series produced on the channel include:
* ''Dorktown'', which focuses on telling obscure sports stories.
* ''Chart Party'', in which specific statistical data in sports is examined.
* ''Collapse'', a series which charts the decline of various successful franchises and teams.
* ''The Worst'', a series about the worst sporting contests and performances of all time, both by teams and by individuals (whether in competitiveness, quality of play, or other factors).
* ''Rewinder'', in which the background and context of memorable sporting moments is explored.
* ''Beef History'', a series dedicated to high-profile interpersonal rivalries between athletes, coaches, managers, and teams.
* ''Weird Rules'', a series examining odd rules in sports, as well as their origin and application.
* ''Fumble Dimension'', a series in which the presenters attempt to create strange and comical scenarios in sports video games.
* ''Untitled'', a series exploring how various athletes considered great in their sport failed to win a major title/championship in their playing career.
* ''Prism'', a series about athletes, coaches, and managers whose public perception shifted greatly during/after their sporting career.
* ''Most Virtual Player'', a wide-reaching series centred on athletes, either real or fictional, in video games.

Alongside these ongoing series, the channel has also published a number of multi-episode sports documentaries, including "The History of the Seattle Mariners" in 2020, "The History of the Atlanta Falcons" in 2021, and “The People You’re Paying to Be in Shorts” in 2022, among others.

In May 2024, the company launched Top Secret Base, a paid subscription on Patreon.

Recognition

In 2011, ''Time'' included ''SB Nation'' in their list of "50 Websites That Make the Web Great". ''SB Nation'' was a finalist in the seventh annual Shorty Awards "fansite" category (2015), and received a National Magazine Award (or Ellie Award) in the "Digital Innovation" category in 2018 as the publisher of Jon Bois narrative, '' 17776''. After '' 20020'' was released in September–October 2020, a third edition, '' 20021'', was set to be released in 2021, but no release date has been set.

Letterboxd named Jon Bois' and Alex Rubenstein's collaborative documentary on the history of the Seattle Mariners the highest rated documentary miniseries of 2020, and ''The New York Times'' listed its first episode, "This is not an endorsement of arson", as one of the best episodes of TV of 2020. In 2021, Secret Base won a 2021 Webby Award for its ''Beef History'' series.

References

External links

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{{Vox Media

Internet properties established in 2005
American sport websites
Vox Media