Bleacher Report

• 1. Introduction

  ›

  Bleacher Report began in 2005 as a conversation between four friends, the kind of sports talk that usually stays in someone's living room. Dave Finocchio, Zander Freund, Bryan Goldberg, and Dave Nemetz had been classmates at Menlo School in Atherton, California, and their shared obsession with sports, sparked in part by Ken Griffey Jr., became the seed of something larger. What started as a collegiate side project would, within seven years, sell for $175 million to one of the most powerful names in American broadcasting.

  But the path from a $650-a-month Menlo Park office to the Turner Broadcasting System was anything but smooth. Along the way, Bleacher Report would be called the "Walmart of Journalism," mocked in the pages of The Onion, and accused of dumbing down the web with custom-manufactured garbage. One writer spent three years on the site, produced more than 500 articles, drove nearly three million page views, and walked away with $200. The question the story of Bleacher Report poses is not just how a scrappy startup conquered sports media. It is whether that conquest came at a cost.

• 2. From Atherton to Menlo Park

  ›

  Two old friends named J.B. Long and Ryan Alberti helped the founding group set up a proper base of operations in the spring of 2007, taking on that $650-a-month Menlo Park office where the company's early identity took shape. The public launch came in February 2008, when Bleacher Report announced a Series A funding round from Hillsven Capital, Transcoast Capital, and Vimeo founder Jakob Lodwick. The amount from that round was not disclosed.

  Eight months after the public launch, in October 2008, the company secured $3.5 million in Series B funding, again from Hillsven alongside Gordon Crawford and SoftTech VC. Freund, one of the original four founders, left the company in 2009. A Series C round followed in December 2010, led by Crosslink Capital, bringing in an additional $10.5 million.

  By 2010, the company had also brought in outside executive leadership, naming Brian Grey as CEO. Grey arrived with experience from Fox Sports Interactive and Yahoo! Sports. In May 2011, Rich Calacci joined as chief revenue officer, and Drew Atherton followed in June as chief financial officer. Just two months later, in August 2011, Oak Investment Partners led a $22 million growth round. Oak general partner Fred Harman, who also sat on the boards of The Huffington Post and Demand Media, framed the investment as a wager on the site's ability to keep pace with fan culture across social media.

• 3. The $175 Million Deal

  ›

  On the 6th of August 2012, Turner Broadcasting System announced it had acquired Bleacher Report from Time Warner for $175 million. The announcement brought formal Turner Sports titles to Grey, Finocchio, chief revenue officer Calacci, and CTO Sam Parnell, while each retained their existing management responsibilities at Bleacher Report.

  Turner president of sales, distribution, and sports David Levy was explicit about what the company was buying. He cited the site's rapid growth and its loyal user base, but he also pointed directly to the multimedia platform as an outlet for Turner's video resources. The integration unfolded in phases. Atherton's CFO responsibilities transferred to Turner corporate in February 2013, and Grey stepped down from the CEO position in October 2013. Nemetz, one of the co-founders, remained for eight months after the acquisition before moving on to advise and invest in other media ventures, including Elite Daily and Bustle.

  For more than a year after Grey's departure, Finocchio ran Bleacher Report while reporting to Turner Sports Chief Operating Officer Matt Hong. In September 2014, Dorth Raphaely was named General Manager, and then in January 2016, Finocchio returned to the CEO role. Howard Mittman was named chief revenue officer and chief marketing officer in July 2017, and he eventually succeeded Finocchio as CEO in February 2019, following Finocchio's resignation. Mittman himself resigned in June 2020 amid staff concerns about a lack of diversity at the company, with Turner Sports president Lenny Daniels stepping in to lead.

• 4. Open Model and Its Critics

  ›

  For its first several years, any registered user on Bleacher Report could publish an article on the site. That open publishing policy was the target of sustained criticism from the moment it became visible at scale. Critics argued it flooded the site with low-quality writing, made it hard to find credible coverage, and damaged the standing of every writer associated with the brand.

  SB Nation senior MMA editor Luke Thomas put it plainly, calling Bleacher Report the "Walmart of Journalism" and its combat sports coverage "toothless amateur coverage." An October 2012 article in SF Weekly quoted tech columnist and entrepreneur Vivek Wadhwa accusing the site of the "dumbing down of the web" with "custom-manufactured garbage." That December, The Onion ran a lampoon that played on the same themes.

  The criticism had a human face. In July 2014, Deadspin published a long piece by Tom Schreier, a former Bleacher Report featured columnist. Schreier wrote that over three years he had written over 500 articles, generated nearly three million page views, and received $200 for his services. His account described an arc from hopeful intern to "just one more drone pumping content to get clicked on." Even after the site moved away from its open model in 2010, critics continued to press Bleacher Report on its contributor compensation structure, its policy barring writers from breaking their own news, and its heavy production of search-optimized slideshow content.

• 5. Reform and Recognition

  ›

  Bleacher Report began addressing its editorial reputation with substantive changes in 2010 and 2011, before the Turner acquisition. Those changes focused on the mechanics of the site's Writer Program, including a formal application process under which only the top 20 percent of candidates earned the right to publish. The company also launched a new-media training program called B/R U and established a paid team of Lead Writers to anchor sport-specific communities.

  Detractors were not all convinced. One critic compared the reforms to spritzing room deodorizer without flushing the toilet. Bleacher Report, for its part, published a rebuttal disputing the objectivity and accuracy of the October 2012 SF Weekly article.

  The company also pursued credibility through hiring. In 2013, Bleacher Report brought in Mike Freeman from CBSSports.com as a columnist. The company then recruited National Basketball Association reporter Howard Beck from The New York Times. Bleacher Report also added Ethan Skolnick from The Palm Beach Post to cover the Miami Heat, Kevin Ding of the Orange County Register to report on the Los Angeles Lakers, and Jared Zwerling from ESPN to write NBA features.

  Recognition from outside the sports media world arrived around the same time. Forbes called Bleacher Report one of the leaders among sports startups navigating the digital space in August 2011. Time magazine included the site on its list of the 50 Best Websites of 2011. Adweek readers chose it as the Best Sports Media Brand of 2011, and the publication named it Hottest in Sports on its Annual Hot List in 2017. Game of Zones earned Sports Emmy Award nominations in 2015 and 2018, and was nominated for Outstanding Digital Innovation at the 2017 Emmy Awards.

• 6. Animation and Verticals

  ›

  In May 2014, Bleacher Report launched Game of Zones, a parody of HBO's Game of Thrones built around animated NBA figures. The show ran until 2020 and earned a Grand Clio Sports Award in 2018. Its replacement, Hero Ball, leaned in a different direction, parodying anime shows and tropes while keeping the NBA-centric focus.

  In October 2016, the site expanded its animated output with Gridiron Heights, a cartoon web series built around satirical portrayals of NFL stars and executives, which also picked up a Silver Clio Sports Award in 2018. The animated series The Champions debuted in September 2018, built around current UEFA Champions League members. Seven seasons followed.

  Bleacher Report built its content strategy outward through a series of distinct verticals covering specific sports and interests. B/R Gaming, covering video gaming and esports, launched in 2016. B/R Kicks, focused on sneakers and sneaker collecting, launched in 2018. B/R Gridiron, dedicated to NFL and college football, launched in August 2019 with web series including Ditch the Playbook with Adam Lefkoe, the NFL Betting Show, the fantasy football show Your Fantasy Fire Drill, and Untold Stories with Master Tesfatsion. B/R Open Ice, devoted to NHL coverage, launched in September 2021, with social media personality Andrew "Nasher" Telfer leading the vertical. In January 2025, the women's sports vertical B/R W Sports relaunched; it had originally operated as HighlightHER since 2019.

  The company also holds House of Highlights, the sports highlight social media network it acquired in 2015. In January 2025, the National Football League struck an agreement with Bleacher Report to distribute video highlights and game recaps, and to grant expanded access to players, personnel, and major events including the NFL Scouting Combine, the draft, and the Super Bowl.

• 7. B/R Live and Wrestling

  ›

  In March 2018, Bleacher Report launched B/R Live, a subscription video streaming service carrying live events from Turner properties and other partners, including NBA League Pass, all UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League matches, the PGA Championship, NCAA championships, the National Lacrosse League, and The Spring League. The service offered both subscription and per-event pricing.

  On the 23rd of November 2018, B/R Live streamed The Match, a pay-per-view golf event between Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson. The payment system could not handle demand, so the company broadcast the event for free and refunded all buyers. B/R Live was shut down and folded into the Bleacher Report app in June 2021. A Bleacher Report-branded streaming hub launched on Max in October 2023 as a successor of sorts, under TNT Sports.

  Wrestling occupied an unusual space in Bleacher Report's history. For many years, the site was one of the few mainstream U.S. sports outlets that covered professional wrestling regularly, at a time when the genre was treated more as entertainment than sport within the American media ecosystem. That history had a corporate logic to it: Turner had once owned World Championship Wrestling. When WWE and ESPN began collaborating more openly in 2014, other mainstream outlets followed their lead into wrestling coverage. Bleacher Report deepened its own commitment by forming a partnership with All Elite Wrestling to serve as the exclusive U.S. home of AEW pay-per-view events, while parent company Turner held broadcasting rights to AEW Dynamite and AEW Rampage. B/R Live carried all AEW pay-per-view events as well, tying the streaming service's library directly to that relationship.