The Olympics: ESPN Upends TV Sports

The cable network is expected to dominate the post-Dick Ebersol era bidding on the Games this week

Minutes after Dick Ebersol parted ways with NBCU CEO Steve Burke on the afternoon of May 19, the 63-year-old NBC Sports chairman returned to his office on the 15th floor of 30 Rock and lowered himself gingerly onto the sofa. A writer from Sports Illustrated had been waiting to pick up the thread from a conversation the two men had begun earlier that morning; as the journalist was organizing his notes for a story about televised golf, Ebersol had gone upstairs to Burke’s office, where he refused to give ground on his salary demands.

This was only the latest go-around between Ebersol and his new boss, and yet no matter how many times the two jawed across the expanse of Burke’s desk, they couldn’t get to an acceptable number.

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