ESPN college basketball analyst and Indianapolis 1070 The Fan radio host Dan Dakich has been known both for his strong takes and for his combative on-air exchanges, and the two collided in a big way Friday. A big story in Indianapolis has been the transfer of top high school basketball player Paul Scruggs to Napa, California’s Prolific Prep, which Gregg Doyel of The Indianapolis Star examines here. Dakich has been critical of many prep schools in the past and has gone in hard on this move both on his show and on Twitter, and that apparently caught the attention of Prolific Prep founder Jeremy Russotti, who first started blasting Dakich on Twitter Thursday and then agreed to call into his show Friday. Here’s the clip of that, which has Dakich just going off on Russotti:
Here are some of the highlights, via a transcription from Albers and Friends:
Dakich spent more than 7 minutes berating Russotti for ruining the lives of high school kids. The audio is posted below, but here are some of the highlights.
Russotti begins by telling Dakich to learn how to pronounce his name, and the Dakich domination begins.
“I don’t care. I have so little respect for you, so when you get talking a lot, what we do is, we just turn your mic of so you’re only talking to yourself. I don’t respect you enough to learn your name. You are a punk, you are the dumbest person I know.”
…“I ain’t worried about some little punk ass like you,” Dakich continued. “So expose me Jeremy! You’ve got an intern that works for you at Prolific Prep, so expose me! What did I do!? Give me the dirt!”
“Can you stop talking?,” Russotti responded.
“No! It’s my radio show,” Dakich said. “So I’m letting you, right now, expose me.”
It goes on from there to Dakich saying Russotti’s ruining Scruggs because Scruggs won’t later have the glory of being Mr. Basketball in Indiana, saying “you sold mommy and daddy a bill of goods,” and saying “asses like you have no place in college basketball.” Russotti later complained that Dakich’s producer wouldn’t let him talk:
https://twitter.com/JeremyRussotti/status/774309931176464384
https://twitter.com/JeremyRussotti/status/774310647668453376
https://twitter.com/JeremyRussotti/status/774311019753582592
https://twitter.com/JeremyRussotti/status/774313597316894720
no interest..too dumb..
— Dan Dakich (@dandakich) September 9, 2016
For reference, here’s the Twitter exchange from Thursday that started this all off, which includes Russotti accusing Dakich of “doing the same thing” and even referencing a 2011 ESPN article that mentioned Dakich’s coaching of an elite under-16 team and contract with an adidas AAU camp:
going to school w a PO Box? Playing for a coach from China? Poaching kids because of a shoe company? Not quite..
— Dan Dakich (@dandakich) September 8, 2016
https://twitter.com/JeremyRussotti/status/773982483448598528
https://twitter.com/JeremyRussotti/status/773983627847753728
Let me see if I get this.. @JeremyRussotti thinks I'm "pimp" for coaching my son in AAU. And this is the guy that runs @ProlificPrep
— Dan Dakich (@dandakich) September 9, 2016
call 317-239-1070..You clearly are the dumbest person we wil have on. If u cant understand me coaching my son I cant help u
— Dan Dakich (@dandakich) September 9, 2016
didn't make a dime!!! Call 317-239-1070
— Dan Dakich (@dandakich) September 9, 2016
There’s clearly no love lost between those two. We’ll see if the flame wars continue or if this conversation wraps it up. At the least, it certainly made for passionate radio.
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