A longtime ESPN producer who lost her brother to gambling addiction resigned from the network after 24 years due to its pivot into sports betting. <\/p>\n
Nicole Noren\u2014winner of multiple Emmy, Murrow, and Peabody awards\u2014told the Columbia Journalism Review (CJR) this week that ESPN\u2019s business priorities have overtaken its journalistic responsibilities.<\/p>\n
The breaking point, Noren said, was the sports network\u2019s decision to license its name to the ESPN Bet app in 2023. \u201cI was out,\u201d Noren told CJR. \u201cI\u2019m not going to work for a gambling company and have blood on my hands.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/noren.jpg\")
Nicole Noren appears at the Santa Barbara Film Festival in March 2022. She is now an independent filmmaker who is working with journalists, nonprofits, and public\u2011health groups on a new initiative aimed at educating young audiences about gambling addiction. \u00a0(Image: Rebecca Sapp\/Getty)<\/p>\n
Noren\u2019s objections were deeply personal. She detailed how gambling addiction devastated three generations of her family\u2014her grandfather, father, and brother\u2014describing a childhood spent inside sportsbooks rather than typical family spaces.<\/p>\n
\u201cI grew up in a sportsbook\u2026 dragged to Las Vegas in the \u201980s and hanging out in the Hilton and Caesars sportsbooks,\u201d she said. Her brother ultimately died homeless on a downtown Las Vegas sidewalk at age 36.<\/p>\n
\u201cAddiction dictated every part of our life,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Decades of Distance<\/p>\n
For years, ESPN kept sports gambling at arm\u2019s length, even after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the federal sports betting ban in 2018. But Noren said the network\u2019s internal culture shifted dramatically as corporate leadership changed and gambling partnerships became increasingly lucrative.<\/p>\n
She noted that investigative pitches examining gambling addiction or scrutinizing major betting operators were no longer welcome. \u201cNone of those stories was greenlit,\u201d she said, adding that one investigative project designed to hold gambling operators accountable was \u201cneutered\u201d before airing.<\/p>\n
The launch of ESPN Bet\u2014which the network later abandoned in favor of a major partnership with DraftKings\u2014convinced Noren that the sports media giant had crossed an ethical line. She argued that ESPN\u2019s editorial independence steadily eroded as commercial interests took priority, accusing executives of \u201cputting their heads in the sand\u201d regarding addiction risks.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey care more about their 401(k) than they care about journalism,\u201d Noren said.<\/p>\n
When a colleague showed her an ESPN interactive explainer on sports wagering that featured bright, cartoonish animations, Noren said it left her visibly shaken.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt literally made me sick to my stomach,\u201d she recalled. \u201cWe\u2019re helping kids and young people figure out how to do something that could be incredibly detrimental to their health.\u201d<\/p>\n
ESPN Fires Back<\/p>\n
ESPN firmly disputed Noren\u2019s characterization of its newsroom operations. In a statement to sports media outlet Awful Announcing, the network stated that it \u201cremains committed to journalism that serves sports fans, holds powerful interests accountable and earns our audience\u2019s trust.\u201d<\/p>\n
ESPN sports gambling reporter David Payne Purdum also defended the network\u2019s editorial record, noting publicly that he has consistently covered problem gambling and industry scandals \u201cwith support and encouragement\u201d from senior editors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A longtime ESPN producer who lost her brother to gambling addiction resigned from the network after 24 years…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":941007,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[322321,49,48,322322,322323,322324,322325,322326,322327,322328,84,322329,322330,322331,393,394,322332,322333,322334,322335,322336,322337,322338,322339],"class_list":["post-941006","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-awful-announcing-espn-statement","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-corey-levitan-casino-org","tag-david-payne-purdum-espn","tag-espn-bet-app-criticism","tag-espn-draftkings-partnership","tag-espn-gambling-addiction-coverage","tag-espn-newsroom-editorial-independence","tag-espn-sports-betting-resignation","tag-health","tag-investigative-journalism-sports-gambling","tag-las-vegas-sports-betting-history","tag-las-vegas-sportsbook-history","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth","tag-nicole-noren-brother-death","tag-nicole-noren-columbia-journalism-review","tag-nicole-noren-espn","tag-outside-the-lines-producer-quit","tag-sports-betting-public-health-risks","tag-sports-betting-youth-marketing","tag-sports-gambling-addiction-media","tag-sports-wagering-media-ethics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/941006","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=941006"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/941006\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/941007"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=941006"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=941006"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=941006"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}