Josh Elliott is leaving 'Good Morning America' for an NBC Sports job

Josh Elliott, who serves as news anchor on the ABC morning show, is being replaced by Amy Robach. Josh Elliott is departing the show soon after 'Good Morning America' weather forecaster Sam Champion departed.

|
Heidi Gutman/ABC/AP
Josh Elliott recently announced he is leaving 'Good Morning America.'

ABC's top-rated "Good Morning America" has suffered its second personnel defection in four months, with news anchor Josh Elliott telling the network on Sunday that he's leaving for a job at NBC Sports.

ABC News President Ben Sherwood moved quickly to replace him, appointing Amy Robach as the "Good Morning America" news anchor.

Elliott follows former "GMA" weather forecaster Sam Champion out the door. Champion joined the NBC Universal-owned The Weather Channel, where he began a morning show of his own earlier this month.

Now that it is No. 1 in the morning, ABC has been involved in delicate negotiations to keep intact the team that got it there. Roberts recently signed a new contract to stay at "GMA," and co-host Lara Spencer finalized a new deal last week. Co-anchor George Stephanopoulos and new weather forecaster Ginger Zee also are part of the show's cast.

ABC took the top spot from NBC's "Today" show two years ago. The addition of Elliott and Spencer was a key move in the show's ascendancy, with the chemistry of ABC's morning team a major selling point when "Today" was hurt by the bad vibes surrounding Ann Curry's departure in 2012.

At NBC, Elliott will work on Sunday night football, the Olympics, horse racing and other events, spokesman Greg Hughes said. A formal announcement is expected later this week. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Sherwood said, "As many of you know, we have been negotiating with Josh these past several months. In good faith, we worked hard to close a significant gap between our generous offer and his expectations. In the end, Josh felt he deserved a different deal and so he chose a new path,"

Elliott did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

No role has been set for Elliott in NBC's news department. But restoring the "Today" show to its former luster is a top priority at Comcast Corp.-owned NBC, and weakening its chief competition by poaching Elliott may be part of that strategy. Another ABC News personality, "Nightline" host Cynthia McFadden, also accepted a job at NBC last week.

Robach, who used to work at NBC, is familiar to ABC's morning audience since she filled in for Roberts after the host underwent a bone marrow transplant. Robach, who was diagnosed with breast cancer, was assigned by ABC to cover the Winter Olympics in Sochi.

"Amy will be a fierce and formidable full-time addition to our GMA team," Sherwood said in a memo to ABC News staff on Sunday.

Morning television is the most lucrative time of day for broadcast network news divisions, increasing the importance of personnel moves at their shows.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Josh Elliott is leaving 'Good Morning America' for an NBC Sports job
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/TV/2014/0331/Josh-Elliott-is-leaving-Good-Morning-America-for-an-NBC-Sports-job
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe