Kirk Herbstreit Goes Off About Chris Petersen's Rant
ESPN's Kirk Herbstreit went off a bit on Chris Petersen and not everyone is happy about it.
This week, Washington head coach Chris Petersen apologized to Huskies fans for having to deal with another 10:45 PM ET kickoff - despite, obviously, the fact that he doesn't control any aspect of his program's scheduling. It was an indirect shot at the powers that be - at ESPN and FOX - who choose game times and channels for each matchup in the league.
Here's Petersen's quote, via The Seattle Times.
“I just want to say something to our fans: We apologize for these late games,” Petersen said. “And I’d also like to reiterate it has nothing to do with us or the administration. We want to play at 1 o’clock. It hurts us tremendously in terms of national exposure. No one wants to watch our game on the East Coast that late, and we all know it.
“We haven’t had a kickoff before 5 o’clock this season. And so it’s painful for our team, it’s painful for our administration and we know certainly the most important part is for our fans.”
Well, ESPN College GameDay host Kirk Herbstreit doesn't seem very sympathetic. After airing Petersen's rant, Herbstreit went off a bit, suggesting that the Pac-12 schools and coaches should be "thankful" that ESPN has a deal with the conference to show their games. He thinks it's leading to more exposure than the league used to get.
People think Herbstreit came off like a jerk, to put it simply.
Pac-12 fans often accuse ESPN of having an "East Coast bias" - largely because of the time zone issue. Kirk Herbstreit didn't really do the network any favors in the argument against it on Saturday.
