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Hall of Fame running back Barry Sanders ranks among the greatest players in NFL history. He was a four-time rushing champion, earned Pro Bowl and All-Pro honors in all 10 of his seasons and could have broken every NFL rushing record had he played a few more years. So when an ESPN analyst made a mistake about the NFL icon, people got heated.
ESPN’s Monica McNutt was the host of First Take this week and did a sit-down with Stephen A. Smith and social media superstar Druski. During the show, McNutt noticed that Druski was wearing a blue-and-silver jersey with the No. 20 and the word “Sanders” written on the front. She decided to use that jersey to springboard into a topic of conversation about Cleveland Browns quarterback Shedeur Sanders.
“The jersey, obviously this ties to one Shedeur Sanders,” she said innocently.
There was just one problem…
The ‘unforgiveable’ mistake
That wasn’t a Shedeur Sanders jersey, it was a Barry Sanders jersey. As a result, Druski had to correct McNutt when she started bringing up the Cleveland Browns quarterback.
Even if the number itself wasn’t the dead giveaway that it was the wrong player, the silver and blue colors certainly should have.
As a result, NFL fans on social media have been fuming at McNutt all day for misidentifying a jersey for an all-time great running back for a player with a different number on an entirely different team.
“She should be fired. She clearly doesn’t actually know sports,” one user said bluntly.
“Fire her,” another said.
“I demand she is fired!” a third demanded.
“There are way too many sports talk shows and not enough smart people to fill the host roles.”
“Ya because Shedeur wears Blue and Silver every day at practice LMFAO,” another mocked.
“I get it people make mistakes truly. But this… this isn’t a mistake. U can’t have a host that don’t know somethin simple like… I dunno? Know who BARRY SANDERS is?”
“She’s one of the worst on ESPN and that’s saying something considering how many awful hosts are at the network.”
“Fired on the spot and escorted to maximum security prison.”
“Yes, because Cleveland Browns jerseys are blue. The people ESPN kept over the high quality of talent they let go is insane.”
“Immediate dismissal along with whoever hired her.”
To be fair…
If Druski had shown up to the show wearing a Barry Sanders COLLEGE jersey it would have been slightly easier to forgive the mistake.
Sanders played college at Oklahoma State and wore the No. 21 during his legendary career with the Cowboys. While the numbers are still different, the Cleveland and Oklahoma State colors are actually a bit similar:
Here’s an Oklahoma State jersey:
Now here’s a mockup of Shedeur Sanders in a Browns away jersey:
There are some obvious differences in the number on the front, but the orange accents would make it just a little more forgiveable.
But that isn’t what happened here at all. Different colors, different numbers, different players.
McNutt’s background
Monica McNutt is not an NFL analyst. She was a college basketball star at Georgetown who chose to go into broadcast journalism. Her early career consisted almost entirely of basketball jobs, covering the ACC, WNBA, NBA and SportsCenter.
That said, Barry Sanders is simply too big of a person in the history of American sports, let alone the NFL, for him to be misidentified for an employee of The Worldwide Leader in Sports.
McNutt won’t lose her job over it, but she certainly lost a ton of respect from NFL fans this week.
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