Former ESPN writer Jason Whitlock said Wednesday the network's derided decision to move a commentator from a football game because of the potential distraction was hypocritical, citing its criticism of NFL teams who have shied away from signing quarterback Colin Kaepernick.
ESPN has received widespread criticism for moving play-by-play announcer Robert Lee from calling a University of Virginia game, citing the similarity of his name to Confederate General Robert E. Lee and a fear that he would be mocked online.
Kaepernick has drawn media attention for his national anthem protests to draw attention to police brutality. Though a former starter who once reached a Super Bowl, Kaepernick has dropped off in production and is now a free agent who has not been picked up any teams; the perceived slight has drawn significant blowback from sports media commentators.
Appearing on Fox News' "Tucker Carlson Tonight," Whitlock criticized ESPN for kowtowing to "Silicon Valley" politics by acknowledging it was wary of a Twitter backlash if Lee called the game.
Amid the mockery being directed at the Worldwide Leader in Sports, ESPN chief John Skipper penned a memo to staffers about how Lee's assignment to the game "might create a distraction."
"Among our Charlotte production staff there was a question as to whether – in these divisive times — Robert's assignment might create a distraction, or even worse, expose him to social hectoring and trolling," Skipper wrote.
"If you look at ESPN and the sports media's narrative on Colin Kaepernick, when the NFL says, 'We want to avoid the distraction of the Colin Kaepernick, so therefore we don't want to be associated with,' they are clobbered and beat up ... But when it's one of their employees who's a potential distraction, they make the same damn decision as the NFL," Whitlock said. "That's the hypocrisy."
"You can't be honest in this society anymore as a media person, because executives and people running these media corporations, live in fear of social media," he added.