Hawk Harrelson’s subjectivity is often a topic of debate, but there’s no debating his latest misstep.
The polarizing White Sox broadcaster used the term “Orientals” on Comcast Sportsnet Chicago for the second night in a row on Thursday when discussing Boston Red Sox reliever Junichi Tazawa’s delivery.
Update, July 2021: This video has been removed.
On Wednesday night, he did the exact same thing while talking about the very same subject.
Sadly, this is nothing new. Harrelson has a history of stereotyping Asian pitchers. Back in April, he said Cleveland Indians reliever Chen-Chang Lee had “a typical Asian motion” with “deception involved”.
As far as we know, the 72-year-old has never been suspended (publicly anyway), despite his many meltdowns in the booth.
You can certainly argue about the ethics of homerism on a regional broadcast, but using ethnically insensitive terms on multiple occasions isn’t debatable.
Comments are closed.