Pat McAfee and A.J. Hawk on The Pat McAfee Show Photo credit: ESPN

Pat McAfee ripped ESPN for announcing Prince Harry will be honored at the 2024 ESPY Awards, seemingly without ever checking to see why they were honoring him.

Thursday morning, ESPN announced Prince Harry will be the recipient of The Pat Tillman Award for Service. Friday afternoon, McAfee mocked ESPN for the decision.


“A lot of conversation about Pat Tillman’s name. American hero,” McAfee said. “Now there’s an award named after him, as there should be in the sports world because that is somebody who is the definition of selfless. It’s going to Prince Harry. Who I don’t even think is a prince anymore. See, why does the ESPYs do this sh*t?”

ESPN created this ESPYs award to honor Tillman, who was killed by friendly fire after forfeiting his NFL career to enlist in the United States Army shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The award is meant to recognize a person with a strong connection to sports who has served others in a way that echoes Tillman’s legacy.

“When you do something like this, you know the immediate reaction from humans and from sports fans and like people with like common sense and brains is going to be like, ‘Hey, don’t be putting our f***ing guy with that guy,’” McAfee added.

Common sense would also dictate there might be a reason ESPN chose to associate Prince Harry with Pat Tillman through this award. Harry, who spent 10 years in the British military, including two tours in Afghanistan, is being recognized by ESPN for his work as the founder of the Invictus Games. Since 2014, the Invictus Games has hosted an international Olympic-style competition for wounded service members.

“Come on man,” McAfee said. “You can celebrate sport, we should celebrate sport. Especially like, The Worldwide Leader should celebrate sport in the moments and everything like that. But doing something like this is just obviously trying to piss people off.”

Show producer and contributor Boston Connor called the decision “embarrassing,” a sentiment McAfee agreed with by adding, “It is.”

Is ESPN really attempting to piss people off through an award meant to honor Pat Tillman? Or did The Pat McAfee Show just never read the press release? The Pat McAfee Show never referenced the Invictus Games while criticizing ESPN’s decision. And for a show that airs on ESPN, McAfee probably could have found someone to ask, ‘Why is Prince Harry getting this award?’ before accusing The Worldwide Leader of just trying to piss people off.

[The Pat McAfee Show]

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