Open Letter to ESPN: response

It’s no secret that I have always wanted to be on SportCenter–sitting right next to Stuart Scott, exchanging hilarious and witty anecdotes and one-liners. So it won’t come as a surprise to everyone that one exceptionally slow Saturday night in Napa a couple years ago, I was home and perusing the ESPN website when it occurred to me to check the job listings, just for fun.

I ended up applying for about five different positions, none of which were SportCenter or Baseball Tonight anchor person. Instead, I took the realistic route and applied for things like “Assistant Online Editor of ESPN.com-Baseball.” So I got my resume all polished and shiny and M. Colleen sent it off.

Fast forward to 4 months later, when I got the following email in my inbox:

M.,

Thank you for taking the time to submit your resume for our opening.

While it is never easy to narrow a search and select a final candidate, we have recently completed the process. The position has been filled with the candidate we feel best meets the qualifications for the position at this time. Please note that while more than one applicant may meet the minimum qualifications of a position, the candidate selected is determined by overall skills, experience, and other relevant elements of professional background.

Other employment opportunities are available and we encourage you to review the vacancies posted on our website, www.espn.com/joinourteam. Again, thank you for your application and interest. Good luck to you in your search.

Sincerely,

Staffing Dept.
ESPN, Inc.

Now, I don’t know about anyone else but that is the most ridiculous automated response I have ever read. If you are going to send an automated response, let’s not try and make it warm and fuzzy like you’re trying to pull a fast one and convince me that it is not an automated response. As I see it, there were two faux pas in the above email. First of all, I love when rejection letters are addressed to M. I totally feel all tingly, like they genuinely are sorry for declining to employ my alter ego M. And two, their touching letter was tainted when they closed with the following footnote:

“Please note that this email address does not accept replies.”

So I crafted the following response, which may have accidentally been posted on a message board for ESPN sports jobs (since clearly I couldn’t email them back):

Dear E.,

I appreciate you taking the time to reject my application for employment via automated response.

While it is never easy to receive such a rejection from an email address that does not receive replies, I certainly understand your position. Please note that while I may have not been the best candidate for the position for which I had originally applied, I assure you that, based on my overall skills, experience, and other relevant elements of professional background, I can write a better rejection letter than had been sent to me. While I did have a chance to browse the suggested job posting board you had previously referenced, I did not notice any openings for rejection letter writers, which I am sure was an oversight.

At this time, I would like to offer my writing services, with a specialty in rejection letters, to your company. As the rejector, I would even be willing to make my correspondence personalized to each rejectee, because that is the high standard to which I am sure you hold your current employees.

Please let me know if you are interested in such a skill set, as I am confident that such a working relationship could be beneficial to both parties.

Sincerely,

M.

Please note that this email address DOES accept replies as I am not a person with a hollow tin chest and I actually care to hear responses. Thank you and good day.

Now, many of you had already read this letter that I crafted to ESPN, but I thought I would share it with everyone again because today, there was a response to the original posting and basically, it’s just too comedic not to share. The following was sent by Christa, a middle-schooler, who also seemed to have a bone to pick with E: *note: the following was not edited in any way, shape or form. Because then it would lose its humor.*

Well hello espn. My passion is cheerleading, and all i see on espn is football.I believe that you should put more shows on espn about cheerleading or make a show.Many people i think will watch this like my whole cheerleading team and way more. People will whatch this because cheerleading is a sport and its very exciting.If i were to have one wish in my whole lifetime is to have my own show on espn or any station about cheerleading and how to do stunts and to teach a dance and to teach cheers.My dream is to have this, And if this could happen it would be great. so please look in to this. I will explain more about what i am thinkning about. Please try and make this happen for me. write back** Thankyouuu.
-Christa.z and sms cheerleading

Looks like ESPN just found their latest employment candidate for research and development.