Remember Get Up, the much-discussed ESPN morning show called WokeCenter by some critics in a response to its supposed willingness to discuss politics with an allegedly-woke viewpoint?
There’s an argument that the show so far has actually been much closer to the “exclusively sports” and “all things to all sports fans” comments from host Mike Greenberg, who seems one of the least likely ESPN figures to ever publicly express a political opinion, but co-host Jalen Rose sure found an interesting way to actually bring some politics into the discussion around Get Up Sunday before quickly correcting course.
On Sunday, Canadian country singer Shania Twain found herself in the midst of an international firestorm thanks to an interview with The Guardian where she said she would have voted for Donald Trump if she was American “because, even though he was offensive, he seemed honest,” and then wound up backtracking and apologizing.
Rose apparently saw this and decided to try and get Twain good with a Twitter video of his own Monday morning, tagging Get Up in the tweet. He’s since deleted that tweet, but For The Win’s Nina Mandell preserved it:
First off, Rose probably shouldn’t be using “walk of shame” in a public comment about a female singer given the connotations of that phrase, and beyond that, this is a weird thing for him to jump all over. And his main problem isn’t with Twain’s comments, but with her apologies for them? Sure, some have been known to be annoyed by overapologizing from Canadians, but that doesn’t seem like the biggest problem here.
There may have been more to Rose’s since-deleted video, especially considering he’s previously made his own concerns about Trump well-known, but ranting about Twain’s apologies seems odd.
But what’s particularly curious here is Rose deciding to tag Get Up in the tweet. If he thought this take was actually appropriate for the show, why not just share it on air? If he didn’t think it was a fit for the show, why not share it just on his own account without making the Get Up connection explicit, especially considering the discussion we’ve already seen about that show and politics?
That may have been what prompted the deletion here; “Jalen Rose has thoughts on Shania Twain” isn’t necessarily going to cause a whole lot of bad press for ESPN, although you never know, but “Get Up‘s Jalen Rose goes in on Shania Twain for Donald Trump comments” seems more likely to spread, and more likely to cause some concerns for ESPN executives. Tweeting and then deleting this doesn’t impress anyone much.
