Hugh Douglas Has Been Fired by ESPN

For calling colleague Michael Smith an “Uncle Tom” at a convention last week.

Richard Deitsch of SI.com reports:

The former NFL player and Numbers Never Lie panelist was let go by ESPN today after disturbing details emerged last week from Deadspin and The Big Lead regarding an alleged confrontation between Douglas and ESPN Numbers Never Lie host Michael Smith at the National Association of Black Journalists Convention and Career Fair in Orlando.

Last week, a bunch of folks tweeted me complaining about how this wasn’t getting nearly the (national) coverage that the Riley Cooper thing did. Agreed– it didn’t. But look at the outcome: Cooper is still an Eagle and Douglas is out of a job. Coverage has little to do with anything here. Plus, you can’t really compare the two situations. Black on black racism and white on black racism – caught on camera – are entirely different animals. Not saying one is necessarily worse than the other, but if you can’t see why one got more attention than the other, I don’t know what to tell you.

Anyway, Hugh is fired.