Photo: Jc Olivera
Former NFL punter Pat McAfee claimed that "some people" within ESPN of trying to sabotage his television program, specifically mentioning executive editor and head of event and studio production Norby Williamson by name during a live broadcast of 'the Pat McAfee Show' Friday (January 5).
“There are people actively trying to sabotage us from within ESPN,” McAfee said (h/t AwfulAnnouncing.com. “More specifically, I believe Norby Williamson is the guy who is attempting to sabotage our program. I'm not 100% sure.
“That is seemingly the only human that has information, and then somehow that information gets leaked and it’s wrong and then it sets a narrative of what our show is and then are we just going to combat that from a rat every single time? I don't know.
"But like, somebody tried to get ahead of our actual ratings release with wrong numbers 12 hours beforehand. That’s a sabotage attempt, and it’s been happening, basically, this entire season from some people who didn’t necessarily love the old addition of 'the Pat McAfee Show to the ESPN family. There's a lot of them.”
McAfee then explained his personal gripe with Williamson, whom he claimed no-showed a meeting between the two previously.
“That guy left me in his office for 45 minutes, no-showed me in 2018,” McAfee said. “So that guy has had no respect for me, and in return same thing to him, for a long time.”
McAfee's rant comes days after New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers made a baseless claim about Jimmy Kimmel -- whose late night talk show airs on ABC, which, like ESPN, is owned by the Walt Disney Company -- being named in the Jeffrey Epstein documents that were set to be released later in the week during his weekly 'Pat McAfee Show' appearance on Tuesday (January 2).
"I can see exactly why Jimmy Kimmel felt the way he felt, especially with his position. But I think Aaron was just trying to talk s**t," McAfee said on Wednesday (January 3).
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