Rachel Nichols is shaken to her very core this week.
The 2021 NBA Finals is just days away from happening and the Worldwide Leader In Sports in dealing with a controversy stemming from events that occurred at last year’s championship involving two of the network’s stars, Rachel Nichols and Maria Taylor.
On Sunday, The New York Times dropped a damning article comments made privately by Nichols about Taylor being picked to host the network’s NBA Finals coverage last season.
“I wish Maria Taylor all the success in the world — she covers football, she covers basketball,” Nichols said in July 2020. “If you need to give her more things to do because you are feeling pressure about your crappy longtime record on diversity — which, by the way, I know personally from the female side of it — like, go for it. Just find it somewhere else. You are not going to find it from me or taking my thing away.”
“In a recording of the video obtained by The New York Times, Nichols and Mendelsohn paused for a second in the course of the dialog after Nichols mentioned she deliberate to attend for ESPN’s subsequent transfer. Mendelsohn, who’s white, then mentioned: “I don’t know. I’m exhausted. Between Me Too and Black Lives Matter, I got nothing left.” Nichols then laughed.”
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Nichols told the New York Times she tried unsuccessfully to reach out to Taylor and apologize. “Maria has chosen not to respond to these offers, which is completely fair and a decision I respect,” Nichols mentioned.
She also added how hurt she was by the recording leaking out.
“I was shaken that a fellow employee would do this, and that other employees, including some of those within the N.B.A. project, had no remorse about passing around a spy video of a female co-worker alone in her hotel room,” she said, adding, “I would in no way suggest that the way the comments came to light should grant a free pass on them being hurtful to other people.”
In a press release, Mendelsohn mentioned: “I will share what I believed then and still believe to be true. Maria deserved and earned the position, and Rachel must respect it. Maria deserved it because of her work, and ESPN recognized that like many people and companies in America, they must intentionally change. Just because Maria got the job does not mean Rachel shouldn’t get paid what she deserves. Rachel and Maria should not be forced into a zero-sum game by ESPN, and Rachel needed to call them out.”
Multiple Black ESPN workers have stated the the dialogue confirmed their suspicions that outwardly supportive white individuals discuss in a different way behind closed doorways, the report goes on to say.
Taylor has declined to respond as of now.
