They've had a noticeable increase in almost-clickbait titles in the last few years. So it's not like they've remained unaffected by the decline in news media.
Maybe they've always been there, but it just took you a few years to notice them. By how often you hear this sentiment (X newspaper used to be better, more thoughtful and analytical), you'd expect news articles written a few decades ago to read like dissertations. Except they all read about the same, newsy and for a general audience. My theory is it takes a few years to notice the crap, but the crap was there all the time.