Careful, Michelle — criticizing ESPN didn’t end well for Bill Simmons.
“SportsNation” host Michelle Beadle tore into her employer during Tuesday’s show, and scolded the network for giving Greg Hardy a podium to begin what she called his “redemption tour.”
“I feel dirty,” she began her remarks. “I don’t understand why we’re doing that … I’m a little bit confused.”
Later, she doubled down on Twitter, which is posted below her full televised comments. Beadle was none-too-pleased with the Disney-owned cable channel’s decision to allow colleague Adam Schefter to interview the disgraced defensive end, who in 2014 was convicted of domestic abuse. In that interview, the now team-less Hardy professed his innocence.
Here are Beadle’s full on-air remarks:
“I feel dirty in that this guy has no job right now, and for some reason we’ve decided as a network that we’re going to give him the stage for his redemption tour as he basically goes out and tries to find some employment. I don’t understand why we’re doing that. If he wants to figure out a way to get his message out there — which by the way, he hasn’t said he did anything wrong, so how a man is supposed to convince anybody he’s changed and yet not admit to actually doing anything? I have no idea. But why we’re giving him the forum to go out there and tell anybody that is where I’m a little bit confused.”
And here’s what she later wrote on Twitter:
For the love of f&$@. Dude doesn't admit to wrongdoing. Dude has changed? I give the hell up.
— Michelle Beadle (@MichelleDBeadle) April 5, 2016