Clay Travis: Hypocritical ESPN throws Jason Witten under bus

On today's Outkick the Show, Clay Travis said ESPN was being unbelievably hypocritical when Monday Night Football announcer Jason Witten was condemning the Washington Redskins for signing former San Francisco 49ers linebacker Reuben Foster.

But when the Dallas Cowboys signed Greg Hardy -- who was convicted of domestic violence (the charges were later vacated when the alleged victim didn’t appear in court) -- Jason Witten (who was playing for the Cowboys at that time was very welcoming to Greg Hardy.

So that looked pretty hypocritical. But, as Clay Travis pointed out, "If ESPN knew Witten was going to say that he opposed the Redskins signing Foster — which they 100% did, there is no way this topic came up without substantial planning and discussion — then the network also had an obligation to ask why his opinion on Foster was different than his opinion had been on Hardy. That’s especially the case when the story about Witten’s opinion on Hardy is linked on ESPN’s own website."

So in my opinion there’s no way ESPN missed this conflict between Witten’s opinion on Foster and Hardy. (If they did this is the most incompetent television broadcast of all time.) You absolutely, positively don’t want your top NFL analyst to look like a hypocrite on an issue this serious.

Now we can certainly debate whether the best place to have a nuanced and thoughtful discussion about the challenges of domestic violence is during the fourth quarter of a competitive football game — I happen to think it’s a bad fit — but once ESPN made the decision to have Witten speak on the issue, they had an obligation, I believe, to actually let him speak on the issue and not duck the fact that his comments on air were substantially different than than comments he’d made about Hardy just a couple of years ago.

So why didn’t they do that?

I think it’s simple — because ESPN is promoting Greg Hardy as part of its new deal with the UFC.

Yep, the same Greg Hardy that the Dallas Cowboys signed despite his domestic violence issues is currently being promoted as a reason for ESPN customers to sign up for ESPN+.

Hell, it’s a top story on ESPN.com right now.

Now we can certainly debate whether the best place to have a nuanced and thoughtful discussion about the challenges of domestic violence is during the fourth quarter of a competitive football game — I happen to think it’s a bad fit — but once ESPN made the decision to have Witten speak on the issue, they had an obligation, I believe, to actually let him speak on the issue and not duck the fact that his comments on air were substantially different than than comments he’d made about Hardy just a couple of years ago.

So why didn’t they do that?

I think it’s simple — because ESPN is promoting Greg Hardy as part of its new deal with the UFC.

Yep, the same Greg Hardy that the Dallas Cowboys signed despite his domestic violence issues is currently being promoted as a reason for ESPN customers to sign up for ESPN+.

Hell, it’s a top story on ESPN.com right now.