What is it about ESPN and racist jerks?

ESPN Co-Host Apologizes For "Martin Luther Coon" Gaffe

Tuesday, Jan 19, 2010 @10:21am CST

ESPN broadcaster Mike Greenberg is apologizing for saying the words "Martin Luther Coon" on his morning radio show.

The words were spoken on Martin Luther King Day.

The SportsCenter anchor and Mike and Mike in the Morning co-host says he was "talking too fast -- and slurring my words" when he committed the gaffe on the radio Monday.

Greenberg issued an online apology stating "I would never say anything like that, not in public, or in private, or in the silence of my own mind." He said he felt "horrible" about the words.


http://mystateline.com/content/fulltext/?cid=130622
　

:)

What were they like?

It always surprises me when people are shocked at the behavior of athletes. I played ball all the way through school, and it sometimes surprised even me at what I could get away with.

In fact, he gets made fun of on that show for being "metrosexual."

...but this is a shocker.

He clearly stumbled over his words. I listen to this show daily and there is no way on God's green earth Mike Greenberg is a racist or meant to say coon

Incredible that he would do that, but he immediately corrected:

http://blogs.suntimes.com/sportsprose/2010/01/debate_rages_over_mike_mikes_m.html

Uh-huh...you know...to make that error, the thought must have been in his head. You just do not mispronounce or misspeak KING for COON.

Guess as long as they take our side most of the time, we can forgive this kind of douchebaggery. :eyes:

Did you even bother to listen to the tape?

:sarcasm:

The person who uttered that slur was a pig as you know...with a well documented disgust for gays...

Mike Greenberg is far from being racist, in fact is quite liberal in his political outlook...and clearly simply stumbled over his words...

That some have decided he is a racist based on this are diminishing the actual racism that is going on...

Jeez, The thread made it sound like a premeditated Rush type statement. We always run into trouble when we jump the gun...start sounding more extreme than the wackos.

in all of sports broadcasting. Most of the other slip in ads for Limpballs, Palin, etc. This is strange.

Clearly stumbled over "King" and "Junior"

be racist...they must all be republicans.

duh

The guy doesn't strike me as a racist. I believe he's sincerely embarrassed by it and that he's telling the truth when he says it was a verbal trip of the tongue. This guy is not Rush Limbaugh.

It was an obvious slip of the tongue!!!

I hope it was a slip. But - Freud looms.

his theories I wouldn't put much stock in this one, either.

The poster above who pointed out that slurring King and Junior together could produce this result (particularly, as stopping as soon as it is started - realizing what was coming out - would end the syllable before the 'r' sounded)is, I think, on the money. Since there is no prior history of any such thing from this guy, I'd give him the benefit of the doubt.

Can't slur the word King and get coon no matter how hard you try.

Say "King" and Junior" fast a few times and it is very easy...

...never once did King become Coon

Keep trying, though...

So the thing to assume is Mike Greenberg is a racist...have you once listened to his show or know anything about him...

..just the fact that this is just another time some announcer has done the Coon-King crap.

Seriously....I am sure that he did not mean to say that. However, this is NOT an innocent slip of the tongue...it was in his head and the wrong words came out.

Which is crystal clear from the tape...

I am quite familiar with Mike Greenberg's work...not only is he not a racist...he is quiote liberal in his political outlook...that he has any though of MLK being a coon is stupid in the extreme...

Have you once listened to his program?

Lot of apologists in this thread.

who never utter a racial slur through the year. And then around MLK's holiday I start to hear little 'slips of the tongue' from these very same people. Must be something in the air this time of year. :shrug:

Hope all is well with you!

Paul

we would really be missing the point of why we "punish" racial insensitivity in the media. That's like expelling a child for using a cough drop under a school's "zero tolerance" drug policy.

This guy clearly just had a marble-mouth moment. If he is fired for this, it just contributes to the nation's fear of ever addressing racial issues.

...have YOU ever made that mistake? Saying Martin Luther Coon? Coon does not rhyme with King...unless you have heard it in your mind over and over.

This is NOT a new 'joke' - it has been done many times over the years by many people. I do not think that he should be fired, but to brush it off as an innocent mistake is simply myopic.

King and jUNior...yes it is a very simple slip of the tongue and is exactly what happened...

You clearly have some kind of moronic agenda that doesn't allow you to see the truth of the matter

...that you feel so strongly about this that you are turning to insults.

I disagree with you but will cease discussion.

eom

There is so much actual racism going that to pick this for criticism makes my blood boil....

King, Junior. Joonior. That's where the ooo sound came from IMHO. It's a simple malapropism, and it happens.

You are assuming quite a lot in your psychoanalysis here. I once accidentally said "testicles" instead of "tentacles" when reading aloud in Bio class in high school. Does that make me gay?

(Yes, much laughter was had by all).

I can't believe that a sportscaster would be so stupid as to say something like this intentionally when the majority of our premier atheletes are Black?

I would like to add, I had never heard this "joke" before, but if someone in the media can still make a "joke" like that on the air (in 2010) and get away with it, then I'm speechless. If this was intentional, and he was confident enough to say it, I have no words.

out of context. Context makes everything boring. Look at the posts that clearly show people have never listen to him before, have no idea of the content of the show and clearly have never broadcast live before. ESPN has it's share of liberals on the air and their reaction will no doubt be a better sign of how Greenie is off set.

Keep *ing that chicken.

I've heard it happen to many radio people but without such horrible consequences.

As fast as that guy was spitting the words out, with the "U" in both Luther and Junior it's perfectly understandable.

My source: Terrell Bell, Reagan's Secretary of Education

so I can't attest to his liberal cred, but having listened to the offending blurb it sure sounds like a slip of the tongue. Just watching his body language when he said it, there doesn't seem to be any intent whatsoever to be clever or cute - it looks and sounds like he tripped over his words. I hope this goes away quickly for this guy because it sure seems totally innocent.

See here: http://maxatkinson.blogspot.com/2008/12/gordon-browns-gaffe-shows-what-gail.html
(Scroll down a bit to the post about Gordon Brown.)

Not only does the "oo" sound in the word "coon" appear in the word "Junior," it also appears in the word "Luther," which he had just said.

Greenberg is a good guy. I think his apology is sincere. This was a sound-formed error of the sort that can happen to anyone who talks for a living.

My cousin, who'll remain nameless, is one of them. There are others. Just because one likes sports doesn't make one a knuckle-dragger. I was a female "jock" in high school and I'm pretty much the farthest thing from a right-winger.
I'm not sure why Martin Luther King, and coon would even remotely be in the same sentence, but people do make slips of the tongue. It happens and I really don't think Greenberg meant any kind of ethnic slur by it.

Hell, I've accidentally called President Obama "Osama" if I use only the President's last name. It's embarassing as hell, and luckily I've only done it in the privacy of my own house.:blush: I blame it on an overactive mouth and an underactive brain.

Jeebus. Cowherd, Golic, LeBetard, Davis, Patrick (no longer on ESPN), Kuselius (sp?) are outspoken Repukes. Holtz is a regular on Hannity's show. In Chicago, WSCR had the good sense to fire their hate radio AM hosts after 10 damn years, and as soon as they were gone, replaced with sports talk, the Score overtook the competition.

Sports radio isn't quite as one-sided as the rest of AM radio, but it's heavily overrun with wingers.

I'm talking about TV. I didn't designate that, but you don't have to get your knickers in a twist. I know *for a fact* that ESPN has liberal. TV. hosts. I've met them. I'm blood-related to one of them.

I live in Oklahoma, so of course everyone on the radio is conservative.

In that manner?

He just spoke an "oo" sound in "Luther," his brain was thinking ahead to the "oo" sound in the next word, "Junior," and his mouth makes the "K" sound in "King" but substitutes another "oo" sound.

Sound-formed error is a phenomenon documented by scholars who study human speech. It does happen. See post 49.

You'd have to know him - he's the most inoffensive, PC sports guy out there.

He was so excited and babbling about his Jets for 4 hrs - no wonder.

....slow the fuck down then and think before you open your shithole.

a slip of the tongue and nothing more. We have real racism to worry about, not innocent verbal mistakes.

slip of the tongue. good grief

nt

Now I have yet another reason to hate it.

Did you even read the article? "Talking too fast...slurring my words."

Have you even listened to it? Did he really say "coon," or did he stumble on his words and people were desperate to find some bigotry in the garbled text?