Pat McAfee has made a very bold claim, having declared that he has no boss at ESPN.
The former NFL star stirred the pot when he lashed out at a top-ranking company exec earlier this year. Things also took a wild turn when Aaron Rodgers rekindled his feud with Jimmy Kimmel on ‘The Pat McAfee Show’.
The Worldwide Leader in Sports gave McAfee a five-year deal worth $85 million last year, much to the chagrin of several people who work at the network. And he’s now claiming to have no boss at the company, having said as much to Stephen Jackson and Matt Barnes on their ‘All The Smoke’ podcast.
The hosts asked McAfee about his beef with Norby Williamson, and it appears they haven’t been able to iron things out as the former kicker has made it clear that he only reports to ESPN president Jimmy Pitaro and Disney CEO Bob Iger.
“I report directly to Jimmy and Bob,” he insisted. “I saw [media reporting] ‘Pat calls out his boss.’ I don’t got a mother F -ing boss. What are we…? We talking Jimmy Pitaro or Bob Iger? Like, is that who we’re talking about? Because those are people that could technically be described as my boss.”
McAfee would also reveal that he felt like he had stepped into a warzone when he arrived at ESPN given the feelings around the company where his contract is concerned. He suggested that certain execs, Williamson included, made it harder to attract viewers and advertisers.
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Still, he claims he did not expect his comments to catch fire the way they did.
“I genuinely did not expect it to get as big as it did because I didn’t think I said anything that was like that crazy,” he added. “You know what I mean?…Like if I really wanted to saw a mother F -er down, I thought I could have done it in a much bigger way. And I did not. So I was actually pretty proud of myself. I was like, Look at me, I’m an adult. And then it got loud.”
