NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 23: GameDay host Kirk Herbstreit is seen during ESPN's College GameDay show at Times Square on September 23, 2017 in New York City. (Photo by Mike Stobe/Getty Images)We’ve got a little ESPN-on-ESPN crime this afternoon with Kirk Herbstreit calling out Dan Orlovsky for his recent comments about Justin Fields.
It all started yesterday when Orlovsky appeared on “The Pat McAfee Show” and relayed that he was “hearing” from sources that there may be questions about Fields’ work ethic and “desire to be a great quarterback.”
Orlovsky’s comments were met with a tremendous amount of pushback from college football media and fans, who pointed to Fields playing through injury and being an advocate for holding the season during the COVID-19 pandemic as proof of his dedication.
Orlovsky posted a video this afternoon clarifying his remarks, saying that he was merely passing along what he had heard from teams and mentioned subsequent conversations he had that challenged those assertions about Fields. However, Herbstreit still took him to task on Twitter for his initial quotes.
“Absolutely RIDICULOUS. Even if YOU aren’t saying it… to pass that along from “people in the know” is reckless and absurd!! Embarrassing!!” said the college football analyst.
😂😂😂
Absolutely RIDICULOUS.
Even if YOU aren’t saying it…
to pass that along from “people in the know” is reckless and absurd!! Embarrassing!! https://t.co/r0RFSr1B6y— Kirk Herbstreit (@KirkHerbstreit) April 1, 2021
We can’t fault Herbie for his opinion here. Orlovsky might have thought what he was doing was merely passing along information, but doing so without quantifying it further was a mistake.
However, it is something to see him call his colleague out so vociferously. We’ve seen Worldwide Leader employees check their co-workers in public before, but Herbstreit usually isn’t one to do so.
