Charissa Thompson faced criticism after saying she made up sideline reports early in her career.
 |
"I haven't been fired for saying it... I would make up the report sometimes," Charissa Thompson said on a podcast released earlier this week.
Her comments triggered an angry backlash from some fans as well as others who work in sports coverage.
On Friday, the host said she had chosen "the wrong words" and "never lied".
"I understand how important words are and I chose the wrong words to describe the situation," she wrote in a statement posted to Instagram. "I'm sorry. I have never lied about anything or been unethical during my time as a sports broadcaster."
No coach is going to get mad if I say, 'Hey, we need to stop hurting ourselves... and do a better job of getting off the field," she said. "They're not going to correct me on that."
Laura Okmin, a Fox Sports colleague and the third-longest-tenured sideline reporter in league history, criticised Ms Thompson in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
"The privilege of a sideline role is being the one person in the entire world who has the opportunity to ask coaches what's happening in that moment," she wrote.
"I can't express the amount of time it takes to build that trust," she added.
Molly McGrath, a Sports Emmy nominated ESPN college football reporter, warned young journalists such behaviour was "not normal or ethical".
"Coaches and players trust us with sensitive information, and if they know that you're dishonest and don't take your role seriously, you've lost all trust and credibility," she said.
Morgan Uber, of ESPN, said Ms Thompson's comments undermined other women "in a profession that is already stereotyped as just being eye candy".
0 Comments