Lisa Guerrero

Former Monday Night Football reporter Lisa Guerrero is opening up on the traumatic experience of suffering a miscarriage on live TV years ago.

In 2021, Guerrero told Andrew Marchand of the New York Post that she dealt with suicidal thoughts for the humiliation she felt after being ridiculed during her one season as a Monday Night Football sideline reporter. Yet Guerrero recently revealed her Monday Night Football tenure was even more of a nightmare than anyone realized.

Guerrero spoke to People about her upcoming memoir Warrior, and discussed the decision to keep her traumatic on-air experience private for almost 20 years.

“People who knew what was going on with [my boss] Freddie (Gaudelli) and who read how I was being treated in the media already looked at me with such pity,” Guerrero told People. “I was a shell of myself. And I felt such shame and embarrassment that the last thing I was going to say is, ‘Oh, and by the way, I just had a miscarriage.’ Most of my best friends will learn about it by reading the book.”

People published an excerpt from Guerrero’s memoir in which she offers a detailed recount of suffering a pregnancy loss while on the sideline for a Monday Night Football broadcast on ABC in 2003.

“I pushed through and did my reports,” Guerrero said. “When I felt a dampness between my legs, I thought, ‘Oh, I got my period.’ And then I remembered I was pregnant. I was having a miscarriage! I could feel blood leaking. The officials’ bathroom was in the tunnel behind me. ‘I’m going to the bathroom,’ I told my assistant, whose job was to race around the field with me. He looked at me as if I were insane. ‘They’re about to throw to you.’”

According to Guerrero, her boss, former Monday Night Football executive Fred Gaudelli who was unaware of the medical emergency, would later criticize her for bad posture that night. Guadelli, now with NBC, spent 33 seasons as an executive producer for NFL broadcasts. Earlier this month, it was announced he was stepping aside after Wild Card weekend.

“I delivered my live report. I was dizzy and nauseated but reminded myself to stand up straight,” Guerrero remembered. “Our Wednesday phone calls, Freddie would ream me out for bad posture. The pain was excruciating. I heard myself mispronounce a player’s name and knew I’d hear about it later. As soon as I finished, I raced off to interview a coach. Then I headed to the bathroom. As I sat on the toilet, I couldn’t believe the blood pouring out of me. It had soaked through my pants. I shoved a bunch of paper towels in my underwear.”

Guerrero writes that she kept the miscarriage a secret that night, adding that it “never occurred” to her to tell anyone or go to a hospital. Her foremost concern was covering the blood on her clothes with her long winter coat.

“When the game ended, I was supposed to go to the production truck to talk to Freddie,” Guerrero continued. “Instead, I headed to the plane. In the bathroom [on board], I changed clothes, and dumped my underwear and pants in the garbage can. I looked into the mirror and didn’t recognize the pale, gaunt, scared, and so very tired woman who stared back at me.”

Guerrero was fired after from Monday Night Football after her one and only season in 2003. Now a longtime investigative correspondent for Inside Edition, Guerrero told People that she doesn’t blame one person for her pregnancy loss that year, adding that it “was a culmination of the entire season of negativity and cruelty.”

[People]

About Brandon Contes

Brandon Contes is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. He previously helped carve the sports vertical for Mediaite and spent more than three years with Barrett Sports Media. Send tips/comments/complaints to bcontes@thecomeback.com