Shannon Sharpe will not be back on ESPN due to the $50million rape lawsuit that has left his career engufled in controversy, Jason Whitlock has predicted.
The controversial sports analyst has been a long-standing critic of Stephen A. Smith and his First Take co-host Sharpe and Whitlock has sharpened his attention on Sharpe amid his bombshell lawsuit.
Sharpe has denied the rape accusations made by his 20-something ex-girlfriend and has countered with his own claim that she is trying to score a major financial settlement from a consensual relationship. He named the accuser in a statement on Monday that also included several sexually explicit text messages she allegedly sent to the three-time Super Bowl winner.
Discussing the saga on his YouTube show Fearless, Whitlock said: ‘If you’re ESPN, do you have him on air… as if nothing has happened?’
Whitlock then said that Sharpe has a history of controversy involving his personal life after accidentally going live on Instagram having sex last year – an incident he apologized for. There is no suggestion at all that he was doing anything illegal.
‘The leaked tape of him having sex with a woman – that was just an accident, he just happened to drop his phone. Now we have this. Does ESPN say “hey this is a good thing, Shannon is in the news and more people watch”? What are ESPN executives saying? What is ESPN thinking?’
Jason Whitlock has predicted that Shannon Sharpe will not return to ESPN’s First Take
Whitlock sent the clip out on X and captioned it: ‘How many different times has Shannon Sharpe got caught up in some sexual controversy? How many more times will it take for Sharpe to be thrown out of ESPN? What are they thinking?’
In a separate tweet, Whitlock predicted Sharpe will not return to First Take. Sharpe was not on Wednesday’s broadcast on what ESPN say was a planned day off.
But Whitlock’s prediction on Sharpe’s future was based on co-host Smith stopping short of supporting Sharpe and saying on his own YouTube show that he didn’t know all the facts.
Whitlock wrote on X: ‘I don’t think we’ll see Shannon Sharpe back at ESPN. Stephen A distanced himself from Shannon.’
It comes as the attorney representing Sharpe’s ex-girlfriend in her $50 million rape lawsuit against the NFL great has released another purported phone conversation between the two.
And just like the previous tape, which Sharpe’s attorney described as both authentic and misleading, the 56-year-old is again heard sharing his plans to choke his partner.
‘Well I’m not really interested in getting choked,’ the woman is heard saying in the tape recording first published by TMZ.
‘I may choke you in public,’ a man’s voice, believed to Sharpe’s, is said heard saying. ‘Big black guy chokes small white woman.’
The woman responded after a brief pause: ‘It’s not a good look, Shannon.’
‘Not a good look that you did what the s*** you did to me,’ the man’s voice fired back, although it’s difficult to say what he was referring to.
