Comedian Tiffany Haddish has fired back at NFL fans after she was accused of being disrespectful towards New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel.
The star of ‘Girls Trip’ was tasked with presenting the award for Coach of the Year during the NFL Honors ceremony held in San Francisco earlier this week
But the 46-year-old horribly botched her pronunciation of the winning coach’s last name, sparking a wave of criticism on social media.
However, the Hollywood star defended herself on Friday as she insisted that she had the correct pronunciation of the Patriots chief’s last name.
‘I pronounced that coach’s name the way that it was written,’ she told the Daily Mail when asked if she had a response to the controversy.
‘Have you seen how it is spelled? V-R-A-B-E-L,’ she added, emphasizing each letter with her hand. ‘I learned how to read with Hooked on Phonics!’
Comedian Tiffany Haddish has fired back at fans after she sparked backlash at the NFL Honors
Haddish mispronounced the name of Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel, saying it like ‘verbal’
Vrabel took home the award for engineering a remarkable one-season turnaround in Foxborough, leading the Patriots back to the Super Bowl.
The coach’s last name is pronounced ‘vray-bull’ but Haddish said ‘verbal’ when she announced the former linebacker as the winner.
As cameras panned to faces in the crowd with awkward looks, fans piled on Haddish on social media.
‘This was another embarrassing moment for the league at NFL Honors…,’ wrote conservative sports commentator Jon Root. ‘Comedian Tiffany Haddish mispronounced New England Patriots HC Mike Vrable’s [sic] name as “Mike Verbal” during the Coach of the Year presentation This was unprofessional & disrespectful.’
‘Tiffany Haddish really should have practiced saying “Mike Vrabel” before NFL Honors tonight,’ wrote Boston sports writer Dan Kelley. ‘In any case, congratulations to Coach Vrabel on winning the Bill Belichick Award as NFL Coach of the Year! (yet to be named) Extremely well-deserved!’
A reply to Kelley’s post said, ‘Yah, 10 seconds of name pronouncement check woulda saved her the giant social media backlash bashing.’
The star of ‘Girls Trip’ was tasked with presenting the Coach of the Year award on Thursday
One post read, ‘Tiffany Haddish butchering Mike Vrabel’s name in front of the entire league is hilarious to me.’
‘Too much to ask Tiffany Haddish to get Mike Vrabel’s name right? Too much to ask someone “Hey, how do you pronounce this?” Too much for a producer to say “Hey, just to cover the bases, it’s Vray-bull.” That is wildly embarrassing…’ said another user.
Haddish was not the only one who made an error in the pronunciation department. Internet comedian and influencer Druski horribly botched saying the name of Seahawks wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba.
In a horrifying moment, he used a racial slur instead – shocking everyone in the crowd.
