Back in January, ESPN sent a memo to its employees urging them not to comment on the presidential race.
However, that didn’t stop baseball analyst Curt Schilling from being very vocal in expressing his opinions of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in an outburst that the sports network is now “addressing,” according to a statement to CNN on Wednesday.
During an visit to Kansas City’s 610 sports radio Tuesday — supposedly to talk about politics — Schilling aired his grievances over Clinton’s use of a private computer server to send classified information.
“If she’s allowed to get to the general election before she’s in prison, I’ll be stunned and upset, because I think she’s shown her true colors all along the way,” he said. “I’ll ask you this: Do you see her being anything even remotely different than what we’ve had?
“I don’t care what her titles are. She’s done nothing. She has done absolutely nothing to further the success of the middle class and the success of this country,” the former Boston Red Sox and Philadelphia Phillies pitcher continued. “She jumps on the backs of people who she wants to be dependent on government. She needs these people to be dependent on her.”
As for whether the former secretary of state and current Democratic presidential frontrunner will go to prison, “I hope she does,” Schilling said. “If I’m gonna believe, and I’m not sure I would have any reason not to believe, that she gave classified information on hundreds if not thousands of emails on a public server after, and what happened to General Petraeus, she should buried under a jail somewhere.”
Schilling didn’t have any more love for GOP frontrunner Trump. “I’m tired of the ‘We’re going to make America great again.’ I get it, but what does that mean?” he said. “If nothing else, Donald Trump has proven to politicians in every corner in the globe that America’s voting block is giving a giant middle finger to the establishment.
“Listen, he hasn’t elaborated, like, on two sentences for a policy. ‘We’re going to build a wall’ and ‘Mexico is going to pay for it.’ OK, how? ‘Well, I’ll tell you later.’
“There has been no depth to anything he’s said. But, look at the turnout. Look at the response, absolutely staggering to me. The only thing that tells me is people are sick and tired of the status quo, sick and tired of the lying, sick and tired of the manipulating,” Schilling concluded.
So, who will the three-time World Series champion vote for?
“I’m a registered Independent. I’m disgusted and despise both parties,” he said.
This is not the first time Schilling has talked himself into hot water at ESPN, where he debuted as a baseball color analyst on April 4, 2010.
He was removed from the network’s baseball coverage last season following a controversial tweet made in August 2015 comparing Muslims to Nazis, and was replaced by MLB analyst Jessica Mendoza.
Schilling had tweeted a photo of Adolf Hitler and the words: “It’s said only 5-10% of Muslims are extremists. In 1940, only 7% of Germans were Nazis. How’d that go?” He accompanied the picture with the caption, “The math is staggering when you get to the true #s.”
“Curt’s tweet was completely unacceptable, and in no way represents our company’s perspective,” the sports network said in a statement at the time.
Shilling later issued a formal apology on Twitter, writing, “I understand and accept my suspension. 100% my fault. Bad choices have bad consequences and this was a bad decision in every way on my part.”