Dan Le Batard Livid After Alleging WAXY (790 The Ticket)/Miami Management Told Him Not To Talk About Penis Surgery Story

Dan And Stu

A dispute with local management over a segment on his local hour sent ENTERCOM Sports WAXY-A (790 THE TICKET)/MIAMI and ESPN RADIO host DAN LE BATARD into a rant that challenged the station to drop him.

The problem arose on THURSDAY morning's 9a (ET) local hour, aired only on THE TICKET, on which LE BATARD and sidekick JON "STUGOTZ" WEINER interviewed his fellow MIAMI HERALD reporter DAVID OVALLE about a story in the paper that chronicled the sentencing of a woman for botching an illegal surgical procedure that left a patient's penis mangled.  LE BATARD came back for a subsequent local segment saying that he would have to delay replaying the interview until later in the national show because someone in management told him not to continue to talk about the story. 

"Nothing matters to me more, than you don't control what comes out of my mouth," LE BATARD said, "and we've got someone going crazy locally right now, saying they're gonna yank us off the air if we continue to talk about this.  And what I'm telling you right now is: fire me.  Not only never do that again, fire me now if you want to control me that way.  NOW.... yank me off the air now.  Fire me now, cancel my contract now.... because this is infuriating....  you do not control what comes out of my mouth."  Adding that control over speech is "what my parents fled" when they left CUBA ("my parents came from Communism, man"), he repeatedly noted that he does not like to get up to do the 9a hour and does it for free to remain local for MIAMI.  "I don't know where that edict is coming from, but go tell that person to fire me," LE BATARD said.  "You gotta be kidding me.  This was in the newspaper!.... This is such a MIAMI story."

For its part, ESPN RADIO allowed the talk about the penis story to air during the national portion of LEBATARD's show.  LEBATARD was off for a scheduled absence FRIDAY, with ESPN RADIO's MIKE GOLIC JR. filling in alongside WEINER; in OCTOBER, LE BATARD told listeners that he was told by ESPN management that he would be suspended if he talked about the infamous DONALD TRUMP-BILLY BUSH tape, a threat that ESPN officials denied was made.

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