ESPN announced Sunday that they fired the employee responsible for the offensive Jeremy Lin headline that appeared on their mobile website after Friday’s game. They also announced that TV anchor Max Bretos was suspended 30 days for using the same phrase during an on-air interview.
ESPN has acted swiftly two days in a row in response to the controversy. They apologized early Saturday morning, hours after the headline appeared on their site. A day later they fired one employee and suspended the other.
The firing was the right way to handle things. At worst, the headline was intentionally racist. At best, the employee had no idea about the word’s offensive meaning. Either way, you can’t have someone who doesn’t know better writing headlines for your company.
