Chris Pizzello/Associated Press

After four years of publication, Grantland is no more, as ESPN announced the sports and pop culture blog will be shuttered immediately.

ESPN released a statement regarding the decision to pull Grantland, and it offered this explanation: "Effective immediately we are suspending the publication of Grantland. After careful consideration, we have decided to direct our time and energy going forward to projects that we believe will have a broader and more significant impact across our enterprise."

According to James Andrew Miller, author of Those Guys Have All the Fun: Inside the World of ESPN, ESPN will honor the contracts of Grantland's contributors and hopes to use the sports writers elsewhere among its media properties.

Grantland was founded by former ESPN writer and personality Bill Simmons, and he acted as the editor-in-chief until he and ESPN parted ways in May. Simmons shared his thoughts on the site's demise after news broke:

Andy Greenwald, who was a Grantland contributor, also addressed the situation:

Grantland added an interesting dimension to ESPN, touching on topics not often featured on the outlet's main pages, including television shows, movies, professional wrestling and sports gambling.

It is unclear if ESPN intends to incorporate any of those subjects into its parent website.

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