Pat McAfee has clarified the thought process on his Larry Nassar tweet that drew backlash.
Over the weekend, Evan Fox, a producer on “The Pat McAfee Show,” tweeted a photo of particularly ugly new Michigan State jerseys, and McAfee responded that “I think Nassar was in on the design team actually.”
Nassar was a former doctor for Michigan State’s gymnastics team and the U.S. Olympics team who was convicted of sexually assaulting more than 150 young women.
McAfee, whose show is moving to ESPN, referenced the backlash he received on social media for the tweet and apologized to those offended.
“I don’t want to say it, because there’s an all-out onslaught against me right now, for simply linking one terrible thing from a school, with the most terrible thing from the school, to a friend in a reply tweet — talking s–t to a friend,” McAfee said during his show Monday.
“And I do apologize, if some people took that in a different way, and spun it in their own narrative to offend a bunch of other people and kind of did that whole thing — I was simply talking s–t to my friend.
“But, does it feel like Michigan State alum[ni] are trying to silence the media whenever they acknowledge that Larry Nassar, one of the most horrible humans ever, of all-time, he was at Michigan State 14 years, so that’s not really part of the story.
“If that’s gonna get us canceled, it’s gonna get loud.”
McAfee seemed to say that his tweet was actually about drawing awareness to Nassar’s atrocities.
“People were like, ‘You need to delete this and apologize,’ and I’m like, ‘Why?’ I’m talking s–t to my friend about something that definitely happened at his school, and I said, ‘This guy’s on the design team,'” McAfee continued.
“This guy has done the worst imaginable, so if he did design those terrible jerseys that Michigan State had as well, that wouldn’t even be mentioned [in his story].
“I want everyone to know who’s coming after me, I believe Larry Nassar [is] a terrible human. Worst human. Disgusting human. I would like to say this show covered that more than probably anybody, more than anybody about how bad of a guy he is.”
McAfee continued to say that he is all about accountability for powerful offenders.
“We need to tell people that there’s disgusting, horrible people in powerful positions. This isn’t something where it’s like, ‘Hey can’t talk about this,'” McAfee said.
“It’s like, ‘Hey, in our history, very recent history, people were given a lot of power that were very terrible people.’ In the sports world. And the way we decide to cover it is by talking s–t to somebody who loves everything about Michigan State because it’s his school.
“If I went to Michigan State and this whole thing happened, if they didn’t say that to me, we would be avoiding something that is very serious, very terrible and very real. So I do apologize to everybody that just took my six-word tweet and then said that I was ‘disrespecting this’ and ‘not thinking about the victims’ and it’s like … What?
“I think we’re talking about the victims, the future victims, and everything by reminding people that this motherf–ker had a lot of power at Michigan State for a long time, while being a terrible human being, and I’m just s–t-talking a friend.”
McAfee said that he sent the tweet and went to the state fair with his wife, and that for people new to the show, he brings up Larry Nassar every time Michigan State is in the conversation.
“I didn’t think it was gonna cause anything,” McAfee said.
“But then I got everyone telling me I need to delete it. If I delete and apologize for that, I think there’s gonna be 150 shows we’re gonna have to delete off the internet.
“I will talk s–t about bad people forever. Sue me. Don’t actually. Shoutout Brett Favre.”