Tweeted-and-Deleted 'Hot Take' By Fox Sports Radio Host Draws Controversy

North

Commentary by FOX SPORTS RADIO "FOX SPORTS DAYBREAK" co-host MIKE NORTH criticizing ESPN SUNDAY NIGHT BASEBALL analyst JESSICA MENDOZA became an even hotter take than usual when the official FSR TWITTER account tweeted NORTH's comment that MENDOZA "is the worst. If she was a man, she'd already be fired," then deleted the tweet, but not before other news and sports sites screen-grabbed the tweet.

DEADSPIN, in a post by BARRY PETCHESKY headlined "We Have Found It, The Place All Hot Takes Are Born," first printed NORTH's original comments, which had been posted to the show's website and deleted but live on in a cached version: NORTH called MENDOZA "the worst baseball announcer who has ever announced the game of baseball. Now, if you want to call me a sexist, go ahead. But I'm an observer, and I've been observing and listening to baseball announcers for 20, 30, 40, 50 years. And I'll tell you right now I don't care if you're CASSIDY HUBBARTH, I love CASSIDY, CHRISTINE BRENNAN, MICHELLE BEADLE, these are all people I respect, ANN MEYERS, CHERYL MILLER. You want me to go on? PAM OLIVER. Because apparently I have to tell everybody nowadays - because of the PC crowd - the females I like before I can criticize one. If JESSICA MENDOZA continues on I believe someday they're going to have to replace her, unless the rating are okay, but I don't care. What I do now is I shut the sound down to watch that game; she's just not a good announcer. If she was a man, she'd be (fired like) TONY KORNHEISER or DENNIS MILLER. OK? And that's the God honest truth about it. Period. End of Story. I listened for an inning last night, and I had to shut it off."

But PETCHESKY also posted screen shots of NORTH and co-host ANDY FURMAN's previous comments with headlines like "PATERNO still getting too much blame for SANDUSKY's sins," "The TRAIL BLAZERS are a YMCA team," "KEVIN DURANT and RUSSELL WESTBROOK are clowns," "GREGG POPOVICH is a tool," "ROB MANFRED is a 'tool'." "CARDALE JONES is an ungrateful pig," and several more, which PETCHESKY called "Take Ground Zero... a veritable Murderer's Row of takes."

SPORTS ILLUSTRATED sports media columnist RICHARD DEITSCH tweeted, "I will say you don't often see an official account from a sports media outlet blasting talent from another network. New world order for FOX.... Couple of ESPN-ers emailed to say they felt that tweet was a breach of etiquette. I say fire back on FOX SPORTS like the Death Star."  And AWFUL ANNOUNCING's ANDREW BUCHOLZ took NORTH to task for calling MENDOZA bad but "fail(ing) to provide any reasons why she’s so bad" and agreeing with DEITSCH that "(w)hat’s particularly interesting here is the FOX SPORTS RADIO account promoting a direct attack on a competing broadcaster...."

NORTH did not comment on the brouhaha other than to retweet three other persons' tweets supporting his "right to speak his mind" and agreeing with his criticism of MENDOZA.

CNN's FRANK PALOTTA preserved a screenshot of the initial FSR tweet:

.@FoxSportsRadio has since deleted this tweet. pic.twitter.com/5QAyU3Lv38

— Frank Pallotta (@frankpallotta) May 9, 2016

« see more Net News