• Loading stock data...
Monday, June 2, 2025
opinion
Media

Fox’s Terrible Week: Harassment Lawsuit, Venu Cancellation

Between a 42-page lawsuit and the end of the company’s live-streaming bundle bet, Fox Sports has endured a singularly tough week.

Nov 16, 2024; Boulder, Colorado, USA; General view of a Fox Sports end zone broadcast camera before the game between the Utah Utes against the Colorado Buffaloes at Folsom Field.
Ron Chenoy/Imagn Images
Hosts of Inside the NBA on TNT
Exclusive

Inside ‘Inside the NBA’ Transition to ESPN

Sources say ESPN management will take a hands-off approach to the show.
Read Now
June 2, 2025 |

One week ago, Front Office Sports was first to report the news of a bombshell workplace misconduct lawsuit filed against Fox Sports by a former hairstylist. 

The 42-page lawsuit takes a kitchen-sink approach; enumerating the whole litany of claims takes a lot of words. The most salacious of them are against FS1 exec Charlie Dixon, former host Skip Bayless, and current host Joy Taylor. 

Fox, Fox Sports, FS1, and FS2 are all named as defendants in the suit.

The plaintiff, Noushin Faraji, accuses Bayless of years of sexual harassment, offering her $1.5 million for sex, and accusing her of sleeping with Shannon Sharpe; she accuses Taylor of sleeping with Dixon and Emmanuel Acho; she accuses Dixon of grabbing her buttocks at a bar, and elevating Taylor thanks to their relationship; she accuses Fox of ignoring multiple complaints she lodged with HR over the years. 

The lawsuit has possible ripple effects beyond those named in the document. Marcellus Wiley, who hosted the FS1 show Speak for Yourself for four years and was replaced on the show in 2022 by Joy Taylor and LeSean McCoy, told Jason Whitlock in the wake of the lawsuit, “Lawyers are reaching out to me. Because when they saw me get surprised by the allegations, especially the one about Charlie Dixon, they said, ‘That is actionable.’ Now I’m trying to make sure that everything that I went through, and everything that I read in that article, is actually true.” It sounds like Wiley is getting legal advice urging him to file his own lawsuit for wrongful termination.

What will happen next? What will Fox do with Dixon? Who else will come out of the woodwork to corroborate or deny the claims? All we know for sure is that the lawsuit won’t go quietly into the night. 

By Friday, perhaps the news cycle around the lawsuit had died down just a little bit, giving Fox’s crisis PR people a reprieve. But then came the news that Venu, the highly anticipated live sports streaming bundle from Fox, Disney, and WBD, is dead

The news that Venu is canceled came as a shock just a few days after Disney bought 70% of Fubo, the “little guy” who had sued the television goliaths to block Venu from launching. (Fubo CEO David Gandler told me in an interview in October, “Our goal is to really demonstrate the negative impact these types of companies have had on the industry as a whole, particularly over the last 35 years, and consumers have really paid the price for it.” Nevermind.) By swallowing its loudest opponent, it looked like Disney did Fox and WBD a solid and cleared Venu’s path to launch. Nope.

“After careful consideration, we have collectively agreed to discontinue the Venu Sports joint venture, and not launch the streaming service,” the triumvirate said in a statement. “In an ever-changing marketplace, we determined that it was best to meet the evolving demands of sports fans by focusing on existing products and distribution channels.”

Or they determined that the effort has become more trouble than it’s worth, an albatross around their necks that lawmakers are still likely to block, even after Fubo got removed from the equation. A judge in August agreed with Fubo’s accusations that Venu was anti-competitive and granted a temporary injunction against Venu that stopped it from launching. In November, the DOJ and 17 state attorneys generals filed amicus briefs arguing Venu should not be allowed to watch. DealBook reports that the DOJ “was not pleased to learn that Disney had acquired a rival apparently to make an antitrust case go away.”

The death of Venu is arguably a more crushing loss for Fox than for Disney, which is more focused on its ESPN direct-to-consumer offering “Flagship” anyway. Fox has no such exciting imminent OTT offering, and WBD is reeling from missing out on the new NBA rights package but has responded by gobbling up other rights like college football games and Unrivaled women’s basketball.

On top of all this, Fox faces a $2.7 billion defamation suit on the news side of the house from electronic voting system company Smartmatic. It settled a similar lawsuit by paying Dominion Voting Systems $787 million in 2023.  

Fox Sports has endured a tough past few years and remains the perennial No. 2 in the live sports broadcast race. It has attempted to make its college football show, Big Noon Kickoff, a real challenger to ESPN’s College GameDay, but the latter is far ahead, often with double the viewership. ESPN says 2024 was GameDay’s most-watched season ever.

Fox has gone all-in on soccer in the last few years, but losing the next two FIFA Women’s World Cups to Netflix was another blow. 

Despite it all, Fox has the Super Bowl on Feb 9. It’s the biggest annual spectacle left on live TV and a chance for Fox to get some glory back. Tom Brady will be in the booth. Kendrick Lamar will be on stage at halftime. Fox will look to get people to stop talking about Netflix. FOS will be there with a team on the ground.

Linkedin
Whatsapp
Copy Link
Link Copied
Link Copied

What to Read

WNBA Championship Ring Boom: ‘Way Bigger. Way More Diamonds’

The Liberty’s WNBA championship ring value soared to $60,000.
Oct 26, 2024; Los Angeles, California, USA; Los Angeles Dodgers designated hitter Shohei Ohtani (17) injures left shoulder whilte attempt to steal second base in the seventh inning against the New York Yankees during game two of the 2024 MLB World Series at Dodger Stadium.

Yankees-Dodgers Clash Draws TV Spotlight, Sky-High Prices

The teams’ lone regular-season series features three nationally aired games.
Softball

MLB Makes Eight-Figure Investment in New Softball League 

Athletes Unlimited and Major League Baseball announced the deal Thursday morning.

Featured Today

PSG and the City of Paris Can Join European Soccer’s Elite

What a maiden Champions League title would mean for the French club.
May 30, 2025

How the Champions League Anthem Took on a Life of Its Own

The composer didn’t know he wrote a timeless hit three decades ago.
May 25, 2025

How Rolex Paved the Way for Luxury’s Love Affair With Tennis

“It’s almost impossible to think about tennis without thinking about Rolex.”
Mar 23, 2025; Miami, FL, USA; Alexandra Eala (PHI) reacts after winning a point against Madison Keys (USA)(not pictured) on day six of the Miami Open at Hard Rock Stadium.
May 24, 2025

Alex Eala Is Defying Her Country’s Odds to Make French Open History

The Philippines native has overcome a unique set of financial odds.
May 30, 2025

Panthers-Oilers Rematch Could Be Big in Canada. Will U.S. Ratings Dip?

Likely viewership declines in the U.S. are countered by robust Canadian audiences.
May 30, 2025

French Open Scheduling Sparks Backlash Over Women’s Time Slots

Coco Gauff has also said the French Open schedule could be improved.
Sponsored

Game On: Portfolio Players Stories, Brought to You by E*TRADE from Morgan Stanley

In Episode 7 of Portfolio Players, go inside the boardroom with Avenue Capital CEO and former Milwaukee Bucks co-owner Marc Lasry on Giannis’s future, women’s sports, and upstart leagues like TGL and Unrivaled. 
May 28, 2025

NBA East Finals Delivers Strong TV Ratings, but West Is Struggling

The Pacers and Thunder are both up 3–1 in their conference finals series.
Around the Horn
May 23, 2025

Behind the Scenes of Around the Horn’s Final Days

FOS followed Tony Reali at the penultimate taping of the ESPN icon.
Around the Horn - October 26, 2020
May 23, 2025

‘Quirky, Nutty, Bombastic’: 10 ‘Around the Horn’ Faces on Their Top Moments

“A quirky, nutty, bombastic, mostly wrong, sometimes right, crazy sports family.”
May 22, 2025

NBC Eyes MLB Rights, Looks to Own Sunday Nights Year-Round

The league continues to shop media rights being forfeited by ESPN.