Curt Schilling, a former All pitcher and one of the highest-profile baseball analysts on ESPN, was fired from the network on Wednesday. This was a day after he drew intense criticism for promoting an offensive commentary on social media.
According to The New York Times, the baseball analyst, who had worked for the network since 2010 and most recently offered analysis on "Monday Night Baseball," was terminated after sharing a Facebook post this week. He allegedly appeared to respond to the North Carolina law that bans transgender people from using bathrooms and locker rooms that do not correspond with their birth genders.
New York Daily News reported that the post showed an overweight man wearing a wig and women's clothing with parts of the T-shirt cut out to expose his breasts. The image has a caption saying, "LET HIM IN! to the restroom with your daughter or else you're a narrow-minded, judgmental, unloving racist bigot who needs to die." Schilling also added: "A man is a man no matter what they call themselves. I don't care what they are, who they sleep with, men's room was designed for the penis, women's not so much. Now you need laws telling us differently? Pathetic."
After he earned criticisms because of his controversial post, Schilling decided to delete Monday's offending Facebook post. But he was too late since a lot of people already screen-grabbed the post.
Rather than backing down, he posted a ranting response, headlined "The Hunt to Be Offended," on his blog. In his blog post, the three-time World Series champion tried to defend his right to opinion. He stated, "My opinion, 100% mine, and only mine. I don't represent anyone but myself here, on facebook, on twitter, anywhere." However, ESPN disagreed with the baseball analyst's explanation, as noted by Deadline.
Meanwhile, the offensive post has become very controversial. Schilling also weighed in and admitted that the manner he did the commentary was both insensitive to transgender persons, which led to the network's decision of firing him.
