The Curt Schilling media tour continued Monday, with the former ESPN analyst stopping by The Dan Patrick Show to talk about his firing by ESPN and more. Here’s the full 17-minute clip of his interview:
Schilling starts off with some of the same unsubstantiated claims that ESPN is racist and discriminatory that he’s previously uttered, but then gets into newer territory when he starts arguing that his anti-trans comments weren’t in fact anti-trans and weren’t public (around 5:00).
“I was talking it on my Facebook page, that was for people that are quote unquote friending me on Facebook, it wasn’t public,” Schilling said. “And you know, part of this is, I’m not trying to sound like a victim, but someone was out to make sure that everybody saw the thing that I posted. And people might laugh about this, but this one really did catch me by surprise. If you look at the meme that I reposted, which is silly, you can’t unsee it, but I made a comment about the functionality of men’s and women’s restrooms. I didn’t comment about transgenders. I don’t care! I’ve never cared. As long as you’re not sleeping with my wife, I don’t care who you sleep with! So, that became something, like the other two situations, it became way more than it ever was. And you know, I own it, I said whatever I did say, but I didn’t do or say the things that they thought I did. And you know how I know that, Dan, I don’t have a racist bone in my body, I never have. At this age, given where I’ve been and what I’ve done, I think if I did, it would be a public thing. And for me, people that are actually racist or homophobic will admit that they’re racist or homophobic.”
Schilling then goes on to repeat his previous claim that he can’t be anti-trans because his son has friends in the LGBT community and he doesn’t have a problem with them, and then talks about how he doesn’t really miss ESPN despite what they were paying him (7:00).
“At the end of the day, I’m lucky and I’m blessed, because the job I had, listen, I was making two-and-a-half million dollars a year, the job I had, I didn’t have to have it to put food on the table and a roof over my family’s head, because maybe I act differently if that’s the case,” he said. “I’m at a place and time in my life where I’m sick and tired of looking at people who really honestly I believe are spineless, not being able to be who they are, not spineless, that’s not the right word, but they’re not in position to speak their mind because they’re afraid of the vocal minority. And that’s not me, and that never will be me.”
Patrick then asks Schilling if he’d rather cover politics or baseball, and Schilling responds “Yes. And that’s what’s going to happen. Based on the discussions and the offers I’ve been kind of sifting through, I’m going to end up doing sports. I love baseball, I love hockey, I love talking about sports, I think I can offer insight into baseball pitching that few people can. I love doing that, but I don’t want to be held to that, I want to talk about stuff that can move the needle. I think in my life, I’ve done a lot and put a lot of effort into understanding the world we live in. I have my opinion on things, and I like to talk about those things, and hopefully I think I’m going to end up in a format that will allow that to happen.”
Patrick next asks “Are you going to sue ESPN?” and Schilling responds “You know what, I’m keeping those cards to the vest right now. I thought, and you think about this, let’s go back, and the irony of all ironies, Dan, I walk out of the house, and on the TV on CNN there’s getting ready to be a show called ‘Genocide by ISIS: How ISIS has become the Nazi Party of our era,” and as horrifying as that is, I chuckled a bit, because this all started because of a meme I tweeted out comparing extremists to the Nazi Party, which is 100 per cent today still a valid comparison. ESPN disavowed themselves of that and said ‘In no way do we believe in what he did or what he said,’ and my response was basically ‘ESPN’s calling me a racist,’ because if you remove the word extremists from that post, it’s incredibly racist, but that was the only word that mattered.”
Schilling then said he didn’t know what he was getting into at ESPN, was surprised by politics’ involvement in the day-to-day job, said he’s more politically motivated now then he was when he started in Bristol, and responded to Patrick’s suggestion of doing a baseball-and-politics show with Keith Olbermann by saying “You know what, seriously, I wanted to punch him in the larynx from the day I heard him speak for the first time, and he and I are clearly opposites, but like a lot of things in life, everyone that’s ever spoken to me has said he and I would have had the best time in the world together, because he loves sports, he’s engaging, he’s entertaining, he likes debate. You couldn’t find two people further apart, so I don’t know.”
Schilling goes on to deny reaching out to Fox about a baseball role, saying “I did not. Somebody that I worked with made a huge mistake, seeking, went there asking if they had a position for me, which is not what I wanted to do and not what I will do.” Patrick asks “Is Fox News a possibility for you?” and Schilling said “Everything except Fox Sports is a possibility.”
This then goes to Patrick asking Schilling about the Facebook post, and after saying again that he didn’t post it but only commented on it, Schilling says “My response to the post was, listen, I don’t know, you are what you’re born to be, if you’re a man you’re born a man and if you’re a woman you’re born a woman. That we have to have legislation to tell us where we can pee now is pathetic. It’s pathetic, it’s embarrassing. And that was my comment on the entire subject, and that turned into I’m transphobic. I would say the same thing today. It’s embarrassing, it’s a joke, that we believe we need government to step in. And let’s be very clear, the North Carolina bill, the transgender bathroom thing was a very small part of that. I wasn’t even commenting on the bill, I was commenting on, I’m not the hypocrite that Bruce Springsteen or Bryan Adams is. I was just commenting on that aspect of it, that it’s pathetic that we need our government involved. Bruce Springsteen’s going to boycott North Carolina, right? So he’s never going to perform in Italy again, because same-sex marriage is against the law there? Or the Middle East, where Sony works, Sony is his label. They murder you for being gay, they murder you for being transgender in the Middle East, so he’s got a very limited avenue to perform anywhere now, I assume, if that’s what he’s going to do from a rules perspective. But he won’t, he doesn’t care, like anyone else in Hollywood, they’re full of shit when it comes time to make a difference.”
Schilling goes on to say that Charles Barkley can get away with more because that’s what’s expected of him, and that sports and society and politics are all connected. This ends with Schilling asking Patrick if it was taboo to talk politics at ESPN during his time there, and Patrick responds “Yes. We were told we’re not allowed to talk politics or endorse a candidate,” saying that his most political moment at ESPN was Keith Olbermann giving him a book on Winston Churchill.
There’s a lot in there, but it’s clear that Schilling isn’t backing down from his past comments or interested in avoiding politics. We’ll see if he gets the sports and politics dual-role he wants, and if so, where that is.
The Dan Patrick Show airs weekdays at 9 a.m. on DirecTV’s Audience, NBCSN, and radio affiliates.
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