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Another scandal rocks ESPN’s lousy month [1]

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Date: 2024-01-12 12:30:50+00:00

It has been anything but a happy new year for ESPN.

Just two weeks in and the network has spent most of that time trying to navigate through stormy seas and avoid one rock after another.

First, as I’ve written about a ton this week, ESPN had to deal with several dust-ups arising from “The Pat McAfee Show.” Frequent guest Aaron Rodgers caused headaches by seemingly making a connection between ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Then McAfee blamed a senior ESPN executive for trying to sabotage the show by leaking misleading viewership numbers to the media.

OK, just that right there would be enough to ruin a public relations person’s month. But we were just getting started.

On Wednesday, the face of ESPN — Stephen A. Smith — went on a profanity-laced, nearly one-hour tirade about former ESPNer Jason Whitlock. Personally, I found Smith’s rant, which took place on his podcast, to be highly entertaining and, from all accounts, filled with facts. But it was nasty. Some may have found Smith’s personal attacks to have been too nasty.

Then came this bombshell Thursday from The Athletic’s Katie Strang. She reported that, since at least 2010, ESPN inserted fake names on entries for Sports Emmy awards, then took the awards won by some of those imaginary individuals, had them reengraved and then gave them to on-air personalities.

Here’s how it would work: Take ESPN’s “College GameDay.” The official entry for best studio show listed several people who supposedly worked on the show, but didn’t actually exist. On-air personalities are not officially eligible to win Emmys given to shows because they have their own categories. Emmy rules state that no one can “double dip” — that is, be eligible to win two awards for the same work.

So, ESPN would list fake names and then, after winning the award, they would take the trophies awarded to those fake people and repurpose them for the on-air talent.

Strang wrote, “Kirk Herbstreit, Lee Corso, Chris Fowler, Desmond Howard and Samantha Ponder, among others, were given the ill-gotten Emmys, according to a source briefed on the matter, who was granted anonymity because the individual is not authorized to discuss it publicly. There is no evidence that the on-air individuals were aware the Emmys given to them were improperly obtained.”

According to Strang’s story, the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, which runs the Emmys, uncovered the scheme that gave out some 30 statuettes to those who were ineligible to receive them. ESPN acknowledged it all, and it put out a statement that said, “Some members of our team were clearly wrong in submitting certain names that may go back to 1997 in Emmy categories where they were not eligible for recognition or statuettes. This was a misguided attempt to recognize on-air individuals who were important members of our production team. Once current leadership was made aware, we apologized to NATAS for violating guidelines and worked closely with them to completely overhaul our submission process to safeguard against anything like this happening again. We brought in outside counsel to conduct a full and thorough investigation and individuals found to be responsible were disciplined by ESPN.”

Strang reported, “While it is not known who orchestrated the scheme, Craig Lazarus, vice president and executive producer of original content and features, and Lee Fitting, a senior vice president of production who oversaw ‘College GameDay’ and other properties, were among the ESPN employees NATAS ruled ineligible from future participation in the Emmys.”

Fitting was let go last August after 25 years with ESPN.

Some of the fake names turned in were close to the actual names of ESPN’s on-air talent, according to Strang’s story. The fake/actual names including Kirk Henry (Kirk Herbstreit), Lee Clark (Lee Corso), Dirk Howard (Desmond Howard), Tim Richard (Tom Rinaldi), Steven Ponder (Sam Ponder), Gene Wilson (Gene Wojciechowski), Chris Fulton (Chris Fowler), Erik Andrews (Erin Andrews), Wendy Nickson (Wendi Nix) and Jenn Brownsmith (Jenn Brown).

As Awful Announcing wrote, “It’s so brazen and yet so obvious you almost have to marvel at how it could go on for years without being noticed. Were Harry and Marv from ‘Home Alone’ behind this?”

Again, to repeat, it appears the on-air talent had no idea they were getting awards they weren’t supposed to get. Brown, who left ESPN in 2013, told Strang, “This is all news to me and kind of unfortunate because you’ve got people who believe they rightfully had one. There are rules for a reason … it’s unfortunate (those were) abused and for so many years, too.”

Actually, it’s more than unfortunate. When you think about it, it’s pretty pathetic to go to such lengths just to give someone a trophy.

It’s certainly not the crime of the century, and it ultimately doesn’t impact ESPN’s bottom line in any way. But it’s a bad look.

By Tom Jones, senior media writer

He’s baaack

On Wednesday, Pat McAfee said Aaron Rodgers’ weekly appearances on his show were over for the rest of the NFL season. Guess who was back on McAfee’s show on Thursday? Yep, Rodgers.

Technically, McAfee clarified Wednesday night that Rodgers’ regular weekly appearances were over for the rest of the playoffs, but McAfee said on X, “He’ll make random surprise welcomed pop ins during big events or offseason adventures but, it’s always been a season thing. I never said he’ll never be on the show again.”

With big news Thursday that legendary six-time Super Bowl-winning coach Bill Belichick was leaving the New England Patriots, Rodgers hopped back on to talk football.

By Tom Jones, senior media writer

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[1] Url: https://www.poynter.org/commentary/2024/espn-sports-emmy-fake-names/

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