Jessica mccloughan dianna russini, Jessica McCloughan’s question to Dianna Russini — the one about whether the ESPN reporter used oral sex to get a scoop — brought back memories, all of them bad.
One centered on Gayle Gardner, one of the first women to rise to the high-profile position of sports anchor at ESPN and NBC Sports in the late 1980s and early ’90s.
Behind the scenes, men she worked with had a problem. Gardner, they said, was demanding — a “bitch.”
Her equally forceful male counterparts were labeled “perfectionists” who “cared” about their work, by the same network executives who ripped Gardner. The double standard was upheld in locker rooms throughout professional sports. In 1990, Zeke Mowatt didn’t stand naked before a male reporter in the Patriots’ room and ask: “Is this what you want?” He said it to a woman, Lisa Olson then of the Boston Herald.
Yet there are those who might suggest we’ve come a long way, baby.The fact that Jessica McCloughan, via Twitter, asked, another woman, Russini (who once worked here at WNBC-TV): “Please tell us how many BJ’s you had to give to get this story. And did they laugh at you before or after,” brings gender equity to the NFL’s world of sexual harassment.
In 2015, even the wife of a league executive, Washington GM Scot McCloughan, gets into the act. She takes it upon herself to disparage, slander, and, arguably, defame a woman reporter covering the National Football League.
Unless, of course, you believe this was a group effort. Did Mr. McCloughan and the Washington front office, who were identified in Russini’s story as the group who had soured on Robert Griffin III, have prior knowledge of what Mrs. M was about to tweet before she approached the keyboard?
Isn’t it strange the Washington organization’s initial reaction was to claim the tweet came from a fake account and not McCloughan’s? The cover story melted into McCloughan deleting the tweet and offering a totally disingenuous apology to Russini. Then ESPN said: “Dianna is an excellent reporter who should never have to be subjected to such vulgar comments. We are obviously disappointed by today’s developments.”Conspicuous in its absence here is the NFL. None of the league suits, from the commissioner on down, has said a word about this, at least publicly. No comment. No opinion. No condemnation. Think about it: The wife of the general manager of one of the league’s signature franchises, based in our nation’s capital, accuses a reporter for one of the league’s national TV partners, of trading oral sex for a scoop.
If anything, Roger Goodell & Co. should be thoroughly outraged and embarrassed by this happening under their collective noses in the House of Snyder. No, this isn’t domestic violence. Nor does it have anything to do with drugs, guns, alcohol or deflated footballs. Yet what McCloughan did to Russini is totally unacceptable in every way.
The league needs to take a stand here. It needs to find out if Scot McCloughan, or anyone else in Washington’s front office, knew in advance what Jessica McCloughan’s intentions were.
It needs to find out why Washington execs’ initial reaction was to claim this tweet about trading sex for a story came from a fake account. And what was behind the release of what turned out to be this false alibi?
If the NFL turns up anything here, should it elect to look into this, the Washington team must take a hit. In the aftermath of Olson being sexually harassed by the Patriots, who were owned then by Victor Kiam, they were fined $50,000.And while ESPN suits stood by Russini, they did not exactly do it with guns blazing. They didn’t go far enough. Could ESPN’s relationship with the NFL, worth billions of dollars, have something to do with its reluctance to forcefully demand the league investigate the circumstances surrounding Jessica McCloughan’s tweet? An investigation that could determine if anyone in the organization believed this was a swell way to thoroughly discredit Russini and undermine her credibility.
For the sad reality is this: Despite Jessica McCloughan’s hollow apology, despite ESPN standing behind its reporter, there will be plenty of people, even some in the media, who will believe what McCloughan tweeted about Russini.
There will be people who see Russini delivering a report on ESPN and either wonder how she got her information, or go further by saying, “well you know how she got her scoop.”
The reality is Russini’s reputation, through no fault of her own, has been damaged. That sad fact, at least to this point, isn’t enough of a catalyst for the NFL to shine a spotlight on Daniel Snyder’s creepy organization to determine what exactly happened.
For in Goodell’s dysfunctional NFL circus, the Dianna Russini story gets swept under the tent.
One centered on Gayle Gardner, one of the first women to rise to the high-profile position of sports anchor at ESPN and NBC Sports in the late 1980s and early ’90s.
Behind the scenes, men she worked with had a problem. Gardner, they said, was demanding — a “bitch.”
Her equally forceful male counterparts were labeled “perfectionists” who “cared” about their work, by the same network executives who ripped Gardner. The double standard was upheld in locker rooms throughout professional sports. In 1990, Zeke Mowatt didn’t stand naked before a male reporter in the Patriots’ room and ask: “Is this what you want?” He said it to a woman, Lisa Olson then of the Boston Herald.
Yet there are those who might suggest we’ve come a long way, baby.The fact that Jessica McCloughan, via Twitter, asked, another woman, Russini (who once worked here at WNBC-TV): “Please tell us how many BJ’s you had to give to get this story. And did they laugh at you before or after,” brings gender equity to the NFL’s world of sexual harassment.
In 2015, even the wife of a league executive, Washington GM Scot McCloughan, gets into the act. She takes it upon herself to disparage, slander, and, arguably, defame a woman reporter covering the National Football League.
Unless, of course, you believe this was a group effort. Did Mr. McCloughan and the Washington front office, who were identified in Russini’s story as the group who had soured on Robert Griffin III, have prior knowledge of what Mrs. M was about to tweet before she approached the keyboard?
Isn’t it strange the Washington organization’s initial reaction was to claim the tweet came from a fake account and not McCloughan’s? The cover story melted into McCloughan deleting the tweet and offering a totally disingenuous apology to Russini. Then ESPN said: “Dianna is an excellent reporter who should never have to be subjected to such vulgar comments. We are obviously disappointed by today’s developments.”Conspicuous in its absence here is the NFL. None of the league suits, from the commissioner on down, has said a word about this, at least publicly. No comment. No opinion. No condemnation. Think about it: The wife of the general manager of one of the league’s signature franchises, based in our nation’s capital, accuses a reporter for one of the league’s national TV partners, of trading oral sex for a scoop.
If anything, Roger Goodell & Co. should be thoroughly outraged and embarrassed by this happening under their collective noses in the House of Snyder. No, this isn’t domestic violence. Nor does it have anything to do with drugs, guns, alcohol or deflated footballs. Yet what McCloughan did to Russini is totally unacceptable in every way.
The league needs to take a stand here. It needs to find out if Scot McCloughan, or anyone else in Washington’s front office, knew in advance what Jessica McCloughan’s intentions were.
It needs to find out why Washington execs’ initial reaction was to claim this tweet about trading sex for a story came from a fake account. And what was behind the release of what turned out to be this false alibi?
If the NFL turns up anything here, should it elect to look into this, the Washington team must take a hit. In the aftermath of Olson being sexually harassed by the Patriots, who were owned then by Victor Kiam, they were fined $50,000.And while ESPN suits stood by Russini, they did not exactly do it with guns blazing. They didn’t go far enough. Could ESPN’s relationship with the NFL, worth billions of dollars, have something to do with its reluctance to forcefully demand the league investigate the circumstances surrounding Jessica McCloughan’s tweet? An investigation that could determine if anyone in the organization believed this was a swell way to thoroughly discredit Russini and undermine her credibility.
For the sad reality is this: Despite Jessica McCloughan’s hollow apology, despite ESPN standing behind its reporter, there will be plenty of people, even some in the media, who will believe what McCloughan tweeted about Russini.
There will be people who see Russini delivering a report on ESPN and either wonder how she got her information, or go further by saying, “well you know how she got her scoop.”
The reality is Russini’s reputation, through no fault of her own, has been damaged. That sad fact, at least to this point, isn’t enough of a catalyst for the NFL to shine a spotlight on Daniel Snyder’s creepy organization to determine what exactly happened.
For in Goodell’s dysfunctional NFL circus, the Dianna Russini story gets swept under the tent.
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