Last week, a publicist working with Dan Le Batard reached out to us, stating that “The Big Game is taking place in Las Vegas and “The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz” podcast will commence football’s grandest week at Stadium Swim at Circa Resort & Casino,” as mentioned by account coordinator Ana Hansen.
The email boldly requested a phone interview with Dan Le Batard to discuss the Big Game and his broadcast at Stadium Swim.
We accepted the offer.
In response, we agreed to interview Dan next week and asked Ana to provide us with suitable time slots.
We believed that the interview would be entertaining for our readers.
Our intention was to inquire about Le Batard’s promotional needs for his “Big Game” broadcast and address my criticisms of him.
One of the issues I wanted to discuss was Le Batard’s decision to hire Howard Bryant, who was arrested for domestic violence, while simultaneously criticizing professional sports leagues for not taking domestic violence seriously enough.
We hoped to hear his justification for this.
Additionally, we wanted to understand why Le Batard considered it inappropriate for ESPN to allow Aaron Rodgers to express his conservative opinions on television, but defended pundits and athletes who used their platforms to criticize Donald Trump.
Le Batard strongly condemned the UFC for intertwining conservative politics with live sports, yet supported the NBA’s decision to display the Black Lives Matter slogan on its courts, despite its association with controversial actions in Israel.
We also intended to question him about his defense of Deadspin’s false reporting on a nine-year-old boy wearing blackface.
Furthermore, I wanted to give Le Batard an opportunity to explain his criticisms of me, particularly his accusation on his podcast that I “proudly wear the hood,” referring to the KKK hood.
In September, he accused me of “weaponizing” Mina Kimes to cater to a group of misogynistic radicals.
As Le Batard stated, “Outkick–good god almighty, shit stain, you have birthed an army of shit stains, man, when you go after that woman, not having any earthly idea how hard it is overcoming all the bullshit in this industry by knuckle draggers at the executive level and on social media.”
As previously mentioned, the interview promised to be quite entertaining.
Unfortunately, Le Batard withdrew from the interview.
On Monday, the publicist responded, claiming that there was a “scheduling miscommunication.”
The email stated, “Sorry for the delay, there seems to have been a scheduling miscommunication and Dan is unfortunately unavailable. We apologize for the inconvenience.”
Convenient. And dishonest.
Here’s what actually happened:
PR firms collaborate with radio shows during Super Bowl week to promote their content. They send interview invitations to outlets with sufficient reach to promote said content.
This particular firm sent the same email to three to five other outlets. The representative then informed Le Batard of the outlets that responded positively.
It was at this point that he decided to back out.
Ana Hansen was unaware of Le Batard’s negative sentiments towards her and is likely unaware that Le Batard has been avoiding comment requests.
Nevertheless, we hope that Le Batard reconsiders his decision. If he can resolve his “scheduling miscommunication,” we are available this week for a conversation.