ESPN host calls out Barstool Sports over sexism ahead of partnership

ESPN’s decision to partner with members of Barstool Sports, a publication known for its crude humour and sexist jokes, has already been met with displeasure from one of the network’s hosts.

Samantha Ponder, the host of ESPN’s Sunday NFL Countdown, sent a tweet to Barstool’s Dan “Big Cat” Katz, whose new show will be broadcast on ESPN on Tuesday night.

“Welcome to the ESPN family @BarstoolBigCat (& welcome to all ur minions who will respond to this so kindly),” wrote Ponder, along with a screenshot from a 2014 Barstool blog telling the presenter to “fuck yourself” after she wrote about the Ray Rice domestic abuse scandal.

“Seriously you sound like a KO Barstool freak, not a chick that has a job where the #1 requirement is you make men hard,” the blog from 2014 read. “So give it a rest with your righteous indignation. Your entire career and livelihood is based on appealing to guys like me and blogs like ours. Bottomline is guys thinking chicks are hot is natural. It’s Darwinism. It’s never gonna change. But that doesn’t mean we don’t respect women and think it’s okay to hit a woman. I have no idea what’s so confusing about that. Go fuck yourself.”

Katz did not write the post and implied it was the work of Barstool’s founder, Dave Portnoy. Ponder then referenced a Barstool show from 2014, in which Portnoy called her “a slut” and described her daughter as a “rat kid”. Katz is present in the conversation, and does not object to Portnoy’s language.

“No person who watches GameDay wants to see a picture of her and her ugly kid. Nobody cares, Sam Ponder. We want to see you sex it up and be slutty and not be some prude fucking jerk who everybody hates,” Portnoy says in the clip. “Sam Ponder, you fucking slut. I don’t want you at these games being super-prude and talking about God and religion and how your kid is so awesome and breastfeeding when I’m watching GameDay.”

Fans of Barstool are known for abusing people who criticise the publication on social media. After one Twitter user asked why Ponder didn’t raise her concerns in 2014, she replied that she was afraid of reprisals. “I selfishly didn’t say anything 3 yrs ago (or in response to their stuff abt other women) bc like many women in this industry, I was afraid of more attacks from their followers. Working for the same company now gave me more courage,” wrote Ponder.

Barstool is immensely popular with young, mostly male, readers and listeners, and was valued at around $15m when an investment group bought a 51% stake in 2016. Earlier this month, journalist Elika Sadeghi turned down a job with the company after being asked to agree to a contact clause saying she should expect to be exposed to “offensive speech, sexual scenarios, suggestive gestures, and references to stereotypes” in the workplace.

Portnoy said the clause was standard for a publication that deals in humour. “We’re not saying you can grope somebody, we’re not saying you can sexually harass somebody, we’re saying we’re gonna make jokes and you gotta be cool with it,” he said.

ESPN has experienced a rocky time of late. In April it laid off around 100 employees, including some of the network’s most popular on-air and online personalities. This month the broadcaster suspended anchor Jemele Hill after her public criticism of two NFL owners’ directives over silent player protests during the national anthem.