A month after John Skipper abruptly resigned as president of ESPN, CNN Worldwide President Jeff Zucker is in talks to take over at the sports network, according to a new report.
Zucker, who has led CNN for the past five years, has been in conversations with ESPN parent company Disney, where CEO Bob Iger has been racing to fill the top job at the sports network, according to a Friday report in Deadline Hollywood.
Citing sources close to Zucker, the report says Zucker is contending against other internal and external candidates to take over at ESPN.
Representatives from Disney and CNN did not immediately reply to requests for comment from DailyMail.com on Saturday.
CNN Worldwide President Jeff Zucker (seen last month) is reportedly in talks to take over ESPN

Disney CEO Bob Iger (pictured in November) has about two months left to fill the top job at subsidiary ESPN, after bringing in a 90-day replacement when John Skipper resigned
Skipper resigned on December 18, making a shocking announcement that he had ‘struggled for many years with a substance addiction’ and needed to step down to deal with the personal crisis.
Former ESPN president George Bodenheimer, who let the company from 1998 to 2011, stepped in as temporary president for 90 days, to give Iger time to hire on a replacement.
Zucker has worked for Disney before, producing Katie Couric’s short-lived daytime talk show for Disney-ABC Domestic Television before joining CNN as president in 2013.
He has since led the cable news channel to a ratings resurgence, reversing declines even before President Donald Trump drove a ratings bonanza across the board for the cable news format.

Skipper (seen in 2016) resigned from ESPN on December 18, making a shocking announcement that he had ‘struggled for many years with a substance addiction’
ESPN could be looking for a little of that magic, after struggling with slumping subscriber numbers for years.
The network has seen household subscriptions drop to to an estimated 86.9 million homes, from 100.13 million in 2011, according to Sports TV Ratings.
Zucker began his career in sports, as a researcher for NBC’s coverage of the 1988 Summer Olympics.
That job led to roles as producer and then executive producer for Today. He went on to serve as president of NBC Entertainment, where he drove a spike in operating profits to $870million in 2003, from $532million when he took over in 2000.