No institution is safe from the woke crusades.
Sports channel ESPN recently canceled Rachel Nichols’ show The Jump, which was a foregone conclusion after leaked audio of Nichols saying in a private phone conversation that fellow sportscaster Maria Taylor was hired on to NBA Countdown during the 2020 NBA finals because she’s black.
Originally, Nichols was supposed to resume the main role at Countdown but ESPN backed out and opted to put Taylor in Nichols’ place following the release of the leak which went viral.
David Roberts, Senior Vice President, NBA Production, issued the following statement on Nichols’ situation:
We mutually agreed that this approach regarding our NBA coverage was best for all concerned. Rachel is an excellent reporter, host and journalist, and we thank her for her many contributions to our NBA content.
Earlier this summer, Bobby Burack covered this story and pulled no punches about what the Nichols’ affair was really all about:
Taylor’s skin color was a factor in ESPN’s decision to move her to Countdown. It’s a factor in every one of ESPN’s decisions. Denying it is like saying hot women don’t get free drinks and to cut in line. Looks matter in America, and race matters at ESPN. Ask any agent, manager, or executive off the record if they agree. Jalen Rose may call it “tokenism” if the winning recipient is white.
Taylor didn’t win the job merely because she is black, but in this climate, her skin color didn’t hurt her chances. Her skin color clearly is a factor in contract negotiations, just like it was in Mike Golic’s when ESPN decided to boot him out the door last year.
The spineless leaker didn’t send the Times Nichols’ audio because it was offensive but because it contained leverage.
Burack also raised an interesting point about how “Taylor killed Nichols’ career in an effort to extort an unreasonable sum of money from ESPN during her own contract negotiations.” This is perhaps a preview of how “woke” office politics will look like when people try to use any kind of remarks made by co-workers that could be construed as “racist” as a way to screw them over and score points with higher-ups.
ESPN claims that it will replace The Jump with a new daily NBA show before the 2021-2022 season commences. Rachel Nichols has had an extensive journalistic career at outlets such as the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel, The Washington Post, CNN, and ESPN. Her resume is quite impeccable, but we live in 2021 a year in which all standards have turned upside down.
Sadly, sports have not been spared by the contemporary woke insanity and could soon be corrupted to the point where they become unwatchable. Feats of athletic prowess are a sight to behold, but there comes a point when the politics that’s inserted in sports spectacles becomes overbearing.
Instead, right-wing audiences should tune out and focus on building business, starting families, getting more involved in their communities, and even patronizing sports leagues that stay politically neutral. The sports programming we previously enjoyed has become corrupted beyond belief.
