The Disney CEO succession is going to transform one of America’s most timeless, influential, and significant companies. And although it’s obviously too early to tell exactly what Josh D’Amaro replacing Bob Iger means for ESPN, the early signs present a changing landscape for the WorldWide Leader in Sports. And maybe a decreased place of importance in the Disney empire.

D’Amaro comes from the parks side of Disney’s business with that taking on more and more importance for the company’s bottom line in recent years. And leading experts are seeing his selection over Dana Walden, who led the entertainment department, are seeing it as a sign that Disney will elevate its focus on parks and devalue its focus on sports, entertainment, and streaming.

Already, analyst Rich Greenfield is predicting that Disney will eventually spin off ESPN as we’ve seen other major media companies do with cable networks and legacy assets. NBC Universal jettisoned its cable networks under the new Versant umbrella. And Warner Bros. Discovery is preparing to do the same depending on what happens with acquisition talks.

But Dan Le Batard and David Samson don’t just see an uphill battle for ESPN’s future, but an impact on its present business as well. In fact, Samson went as far as to say that the pressure is now building on Jimmy Pitaro to keep performing at a high level with Disney’s investment priorities looking like they will lie elsewhere for the foreseeable future.

“ESPN has become a line item in the Disney Portfolio” pic.twitter.com/ryLOMG0kht

— Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz (@LeBatardShow) February 5, 2026

“The president of ESPN, Jimmy Pitaro, is wounded by the fact that Disney has decided to replace Bob Iger with somebody who basically just runs the parks,” Le Batard said. In asking David Samson what happens with ESPN now that they don’t hold the same position on the Disney hierarchy, the former Marlins executive was blunt in his analysis.

“ESPN has been a line item at Disney for a while. And what this line of succession has done, it’s basically made Jimmy Pitaro somewhat of a eunuch where he has to perform as a silo in a way that he’s not going to get the $20 million to get another Stephen A. Smith to the extent that would even be something they’d want. They’re going to have to perform as an entity that helps the overall stock price of Disney because they, the board, voted to bring in D’Amaro,” Samson replied.

“And what his job is basically, run a company that will get us EPS, will get us earnings per share. And so ESPN will have to be profitable. They will have to find a way. The old days of cable and everything that Skipper did when they were printing money and they were the behemoth of getting ever sport right live and every anchor. Everyone wanted to be ESPN. Those days are over.”

It’s no secret that ESPN and pretty much every other media company has faced headwinds in recent years. But Jimmy Pitaro has to be given credit for managing the situation about as best as could be expected. It’s been far from perfect, but in 2025 he managed to launch ESPN Unlimited and finally gain a significant investment from a partner in the NFL. The company has more than held its ground as the WorldWide Leader in Sports.

But the business is not going to get any easier. Streaming profit margins are nowhere close to the glory days of the cable bundle. And ESPN will have to keep spending in order to keep subscriptions going. Given Disney’s emphasis on parks, the network is going to have to keep proving its value to shareholders quarter after quarter.

As Samson and Le Batard point out, the biggest headwind may just be their position in the Disney portfolio. Given the challenges in modern media and entertainment, there may come a point where Disney doesn’t see the long-term value anymore in having ESPN as part of the wider family. And that’s when ESPN may find themselves on their own in trying to navigate the modern media landscape on their own.