ESPN college football analyst Paul Finebaum was back on the network’s top morning shows Tuesday following accusations that he’s been benched over comments he made on a conservative radio program about mulling a MAGA-backed run for political office.
While Finebaum has continued to host his call-in talk show on ESPN’s SEC network, he had not appeared on the sports giant’s other programming in recent days, prompting speculation that he’d been benched over the interview.
The supposed ban, which ESPN has vehemently denied was ever in place, was apparently short-lived as Finebaum made his regularly scheduled Tuesday morning appearances on the programs Get Up and First Take.
Still, First Take host Stephen A. Smith – no stranger to controversy himself – appeared to allude to Finebaum’s recent absence from the show at the top of their discussion on Tuesday.
“First of all, it’s good to see you. I missed you last week, buddy,” Smith said.
“Finebaum was never banned. Any reporting on this is totally false,” an ESPN spokesperson told The Independent.
Additionally, the network noted that Finebaum’s Tuesday appearances for both Get Up and First Take had been on the schedule and were not reactive to recent news, further stating that he was also already scheduled to appear on SportsCenter this coming weekend.
Reiterating that the network “literally” has dozens of college football analysts on its roster, the network said that schedules often change on a weekly basis. On top of that, in the event that Finebaum does decide to run for office, ESPN is looking to give other analysts increased airtime in order to prepare for Finebaum’s potential absence.
Beyond that, despite his recent absence from some ESPN programming, Finebaum has continued to host his daily show and appear on SEC Nation.
Tensions have reportedly escalated behind the scenes between Finebaum and the sports giant after his radio interview last week with right-wing pundit Clay Travis, the founder of the Fox-owned sports site Outkick.
During that sitdown, Finebaum – who has been with ESPN since 2014 – declared that he was considering a run for the U.S. Senate in Alabama as a Republican, replacing the retiring Tommy Tuberville.
Besides expressing interest in political office, saying it was due in part to the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, Finebaum also went scorched earth on his employer, claiming the network shot down his effort to interview Donald Trump in 2019. He further noted that he is a MAGA supporter and would have no choice but to run if Trump backed him.
Travis, who has long accused ESPN of liberal bias, reported this week that in the wake of his interview with Finebaum, the cable sports empire had canceled the college football analyst from making appearances on all of its shows, including some he had regularly made for the past decade.
While Finebaum had continued to host his daily afternoon call-in show on ESPN’s SEC network since the September 29 interview, and he did appear on Get Up the following day, he was absent from ESPN programming over the weekend and on Monday’s broadcasts of Get Up and First Take, where he is a regular contributor.
The absence was notable, especially as this is the heart of college football season when Finebaum’s presence is most ubiquitous, prompting many right-wing commentators to claim that ESPN was punishing him for promoting his conservative politics.
Travis, for his part, compared the situation to Disney’s decision to briefly pull ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel off the air amid right-wing outrage over comments he made about Kirk.
“The decision to pull @finebaum from @espn also follows the recent @jimmykimmel controversy on Disney owned ABC,” Travis tweeted. “Kimmel was returned to air after a four day suspension. The left wing rallied around Kimmel’s free speech rights in that case. Will they rally for @finebaum as well?”
Meanwhile, after Travis reported that ESPN and its parent company Disney had removed Finebaum from appearing on the sports channel’s programming, an ESPN media relations manager fired back with an all-caps tweet: “TOTALLY FALSE.”
“After Travis’s report, several people familiar with Finebaum’s situation offered competing views of what’s happening at the network. ESPN, one person said, has rotating schedules and could be looking for new talent to replace Finebaum in the event he actually leaves to get into politics,” the Washington Post reported.
Additionally, it was noted by other sports reporters that Finebaum was never “banned” from ESPN airwaves and was still scheduled to appear on Tuesday’s broadcasts of Get Up and First Take for a previously scheduled appearance. WBRC’s Jonathan Hardison added that a source “stated that the network is attempting to provide more exposure to other college football commentators if Finebaum runs for office.”
Finebaum, for his part, has tried to avoid the issue on his own show. During Monday’s broadcast of The Paul Finebaum Show, one caller mentioned that he’d seen “a blurb that you’d been pulled off some of the ESPN programs,” only for the person to be immediately yanked off the air and his call dropped. Finebaum merely moved on to another subject as if nothing had happened.
As for how genuine the talk of Finebaum running for Senate is, Politico’s Jonathan Martin reported this past weekend that the football talk host is “set to visit Washington for meetings with Republicans later this month and is serious about a possible bid.” Still, Martin warned that Finebaum would need to contend with one major hurdle if he were to decide to run.
“Finebaum could become a latter-day Trumper, same as others in the GOP who’ve undergone MAGA conversion therapy, but there is a catch,” Martin noted “The president’s total and complete endorsement comes with an unwritten disclaimer: If your conscience ever moves you and you criticize him, that endorsement can be withdrawn just as quickly as it was proffered.”
While ESPN had been trying to establish a “stick to sports” identity and urged its talent to stay out of the political fray following Trump’s first term, the network has taken a more permissive approach recently.
Smith, for instance, has publicly weighed a presidential run in 2028 while veering further into political punditry. In fact, his latest contract extension with ESPN allows him additional space to devote to political commentary outside of the network, which includes his podcast and a new show on SiriusXM.
“And after Pat McAfee ripped a network executive on ESPN’s airwaves two years ago without being publicly disciplined, it is more difficult to punish other talent for their criticism of the company, several industry insiders said,” the Washington Post pointed out.
