Sports reporter Erin Andrews recounted on her podcast how she nearly quit her career early on due to mistreatment by a Tampa Bay Buccaneers player.
While starting out freelancing for an Orlando station, Andrews was sent to the Bucs locker room for player sound.
Andrews said, “I was working freelance for an Orlando station, and they wanted sound from the Bucs’ locker room. A particular player was so nasty to me.”
One unnamed player turned his back on her visibly upset during an interview and rudely told her to rehearse her question.
She recalled, “He physically turned his back away from me in the middle of his scrum. He also told me to go back, rehearse my question and come back when I was ready. I was mortified.
“I was 19, 20 years old. I had practiced. I did slip up a little bit, I stumbled. He knew it. He knew I was young. I instantly started having tears come down my face,” confessed Andrews.
Thankfully, Derrick Brooks and John Lynch comforted her.
“Two players in particular, Derrick Brooks and John Lynch, saw it, pulled me over, and said, ‘What do you need?’ … Royalty!” she celebrated.
The experience almost scared Andrews away from sports reporting, but she has since become one of the most prominent figures in the industry while working for ESPN and Fox Sports over the past two decades.
