Cam Newton was silenced from his seat at ESPN, but he still has a platform and opened up about getting fired by ESPN alongside Ryan Clark, Bart Scott and other prominent sports voices in this latest round of massive layoffs.
Cam Newton Makes Video Statement About ESPN Firing: Drops Jewels
Newton says he viewed his time at the network as an internship and holds no resentment toward the company. His experience actually opened up his eyes to how much more effort he needs to put into his own brand and podcast.
“I want you to learn one rule about the times we live in right now: If you don’t own your own platform you’re gonna get overlooked, bypassed and be extinct like dinosaurs. … Ryan Clark gonna be OK, ‘The Pivot’ ain’t going nowhere. It’s unfortunate what happened to me, but I got ‘4th & 1,’ I ain’t going nowhere.”
ESPN is certainly not the end all, it’s just harder to build your own brand and make money. ESPN is a huge conglomerate that can just cut enormous checks for notable voices to show up. That’s a lot easier than actually building a brand from the ground up with your own money.
Fans React To Cam Newton’s Video Response To Getting Fired By ESPN
Newton has a following, but it was definitely driven by his presence on “First Take” with Stephen A. Smith. Now he has to build his “4th and 1” podcast platform by being talented and entertaining and acquiring a larger audience without the big company push. The former Super Bowl quarterback is back to square one. ESPN originally took a chance and brought him into the fold because of the backing of Stephen A. Smith and the success of his own podcast.
“People need to stop and realize all these ex-pro athletes are millionaires dozens of times over. You’ll never have as much as they have today. Nobody is going to cry over them losing their plush ESPN gig to pad their pockets even more,” one fan replied to the video.
“Good for Cam for not taking the easy route of yelling racism!” said another fan on X.
“Something tells me there’s not a lot of people who tune in to hear what Cam Newton has to say. Hence why ESPN canned him,” a third fan commented.
The backlash for Cam’s dismissal wasn’t as loud as that for Ryan and fans noticed it. At the same time, they gave Cam credit for being resilient and using this as a learning experience to empower himself.
A video of Cam working out and talking about his daily regimen after getting laid off, showed him in good spirits.
“Stop avoiding the hard. The journey that you know is gonna help you the most. Lock in. I’m back in the gym. I’m back in that mode. I wake up at 4:45 to make it to a 5:30 boot camp class. After that I go get content. After that I lift heavy. I work out. I take pride in doing the hard stuff. Everybody who is successful has done something tough that required them to do it tough. Not take the easy way,” Cam said, while flexing his muscles and showing no signs of dissapointment.
“I don’t see anybody campaigning for Cam like they are with Ryan,” one X user commented. This is the energy you need. Gotta keep moving,”
“Respect to Cam man. People can clown him all they want but he has 4th and 1 and that helped him get a deal with espn. He is right, he will be better in the long term for what he learned during his time there,” a netizen said in support of Cam.
Cam Gets People To React One Way Or Another
The negative feedback was still prevalent as well.
“No one on the planet asked you to take off your shirt because you got fired man,” another fan quipped.
“This dude with his weird ass granny hats,” another fan quipped.
“These ex-pro athletes are millionaires dozens of times over. Nobody’s going to cry over them losing their plush ESPN gig to pad their pockets even more,” another unsympathetic fan commented
“He needs to stop acting like a cartoon character. His takes are awesome,” another commented.
Cam’s Podcast Is Successful and Growing
Cam Newton’s podcast, “4th & 1,” is one of the most prominent athlete-led sports shows, reportedly boasting 550K subscribers on his YouTube channel. So Cam generates strong engagement and routinely pulls in over 2 million monthly video views while often going viral for his wild takes on the NFL and life in general. Without ESPN as a boost he will have to work twice as hard to keep his money train going and Newton seems to understand that.
