The Rocky has been part of a joint operating agreement with MediaNews Group’s Denver Post for about eight years. The deal, sanctioned by the U.S. Justice Dept., allowed the two rivals to co-exist by sharing back-office services. As part of that deal, Scripps had a 50 percent stake in the Denver Newspaper Agency, the entity that was formed to manage those operations. Scripps still has its 50-50 ownership split with MediaNews on Boulder’s Daily Camera and several other small Colorado papers.

SEE ALSO: Newspaper Roundup: NYTCo; Denver Post/Rocky Mountain News; Sun-Times

The demise of one of Denver’s two daily newspapers comes as other major cities are facing the prospect of being able to only support a single metro paper. Hearst has just put the sell or die threat to San Francisco Chronicle and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer; the latter could also be spared by turning into a web-only product. A decision on the Seattle P-I is expected by the second week in March.

—Denver Post hires Rocky reporters: At least some Rocky journos will still have a job after Friday. A memo posted on Romenesko from Greg Moore, editor of the DP, hopes to win over its former rival’s readers by hiring about a half dozen Rocky reporters. The hires represent about 5 percent of the Scripps’ paper’s workforce.