On Veterans Day, US President Donald Trump phoned into Pat McAfee’s show, hosted from the Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island in South Carolina. The show saw Trump boasting about his political prowess while also taking shots at former president Joe Biden.
This comes in the wake of financially distressing holdout between ESPN’s parent company Disney and YouTube TV over streaming. The holdout, which is now in its third week, saw Disney shares plunge 8% in early Thursday trading hours.
According to sports commentator Jason Whitlock, McAfee having Trump phone in during his show was a move to put ESPN into positive light.
“ESPN needs that. They need someone that’s outside their control. Maybe there’s some intent here by someone, maybe Jimmy Pitaro, that wants Pat McAfee to kick over the tables and overturn the apple cart. Pat is lucky he’s based in Indianapolis and doesn’t have to be anywhere near Bristol.
“This allows them to say, “See, we’re not that bad. Look what we let McAfee do. We let McAfee do [the Trump interview].” So, this helps them in their minds probably balance things out a little bit. They might be “woke and idiots on pretty much every single topic,” but they have McAfee over here talking to Donald Trump. So, “See, we’re not that bad.” They’re using this. They’re not going to say no, and it helps them.”
Whitlock recalled his own experience working on The Undefeated when he was asked to meet several interested groups.
“I’ll never forget when I came back to run The Undefeated, launch The Undefeated,” Whitlock added. “They had me meeting with so many different special-interest groups. I mean, ‘Here, you got to meet with the Black employees. You got to meet with the gay employees. You got to meet with this group and that group.’ And I was like, ‘No, man. I’m just here to run The Undefeated. Why don’t’ ‘Well, you got to make peace with all these people.’ And it just… it undercuts you. You can’t get anything accomplished.”
Finally, Whitlock threw a jab at Bill Simmons to highlight the independent version of Pat McAfee.
“Pat, being independent and coming there… you know, Bill Simmons must be rolling over in his office thinking about, ‘Man, they thought I was uncontrollable. Look at Pat,'” Whitlock said.
Sage Steele Reveals Feelings Regarding Relationship Between ESPN And Pat McAfee
Jason Whitlock invited former ESPN host Sage Steele on his “Fearless with Jason Whitlock” podcast where the two discussed about Pat McAfee’s conduct far from conventional approach taken by other analysts of the network.
During the show, Steele stated that McAfee has “full control” at ESPN, adding:
“That man has no rules,” she said. “And I think it’s hysterical because I’m picturing being a fly on the wall watching the executives meltdown as this interview happened yesterday. But they could not tell him no.”
Steele mentioned that McAfee didn’t face any punishment despite calling out former ESPN executive Norby Williamson as a “rat.”
“For that to happen and there be no — whether everybody agrees or not — when you rip an executive, name drop and call him names and nothing happens, you know that you have full control,” she said.
Steele concluded that ESPN just can’t tame Pat McAfee who continues to drive attention with his unfiltered takes and unconventional approach.
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