Six Ways for Jemele Hill to Stick it to ESPN, as Revenge for her Suspension
Today, news broke that ESPN Sportscenter anchor Jemele Hill was suspended for…not liking racism, I guess? Here was the official Tweet put out by ESPN’s PR staff:
Hill, who has recently found herself involved in the debate surrounding the United States national anthem and NFL players’ rights to kneel during the pre-game song had issued a series of Tweets relating to Jerry Jones and his recent statement that he was going to bench any Cowboys players who “disrespected the flag.”
Hill was suspended two weeks for the mere mention of the efficacy of boycotts, when trying to send a message to those in power.
While I’m fairly lukewarm on Hill as a TV personality, having never really consumed enough of The Six to get a feel for her one way or the other, what I am a giant fan of is this: revenge. Slow-creeping, elaborate, fire and brimstone vengeance. The kind that you hold in your mouth, acidic tingling of vitriol tugging at the back of your taste buds before gleefully spitting it out like a fire-breathing menace.
So, here’s a few dishes that I’ve got ready for Jemele to serve to ESPN cold, just the way it’s supposed to be done.
1. She should kidnap Tim Tebow. Seriously. Don’t hurt him or anything, but toss him in the back of her car after tying up his needlessly gigantic biceps and peel out of that employee parking lot without looking back.
ESPN would immediately collapse in on itself like a dying star, attempting to breathlessly fill this 96 hours worth of programming per month that they devote to Tebow’s whatever-the-hell-he’s-doing-now-career. They would immediately start shoveling steaming piles of JJ Watt into their furnace of regurgitated ideas and quickly burn themselves to The English Patient levels in no time.
Desperate for some kind of kneeling story that won’t make Jerry Jones angry, they’ll readily fire 12 more staff writers, pivot that shit directly to video, and then pay you the million you’ve asked for.
2. Sign up for the 280-character Twitter. Think of all the totally logical, relatively sane takes she could type out in even longer detail that would make John Skipper’s eye twitch so hard that his dollar signs turn to actual pupils for a moment.
3. Sneak back onto ESPN’s campus undercover as a temp worker Shemele Bill, where she will give a series of increasingly scalding hot takes, each one more idiotic and profusely moronic, each one more acid-trip batshit off the wall than the last.
She would immediately be promoted and get her own debate-themed show, inevitably co-hosted by Mike Golic’s son. Then, on the first episode, she should rip off her mask and spike it onto the floor — while whatever generic, platitudinous former player is on set talking about whether or not Mitchell Trubisky is a franchise QB — in a stirring and dramatic revelation.
4. Take a knee during the United States of Disney’s real national anthem: the next Star Wars preview. Seriously. They have more pomp and circumstance surrounding a teaser trailer about their 33rd franchise expansion then when Xtina trots out to midfield and stumbles through the Twilight’s last gleaming. You wanna hit these cross-promoting dweebs where it hurts? Kick them right in the Death Stars.
5. Drop a confused, hammered drunk, Chris Berman off at ESPN’s employee parking lot with a sixer of high life and a Hawaiian shirt promising that the network wants him back, just so he can hoarsely wander around the hallways shouting “Back, back, back…” until security comes and hauls him away.
6. Do a live broadcast of a Gettysburg College football game with ESPN employee Robert Lee and color commentator Bill Simmons, something that will cause ESPN’s PR staff to Tweet out trigger warnings so fast that their fingers spontaneously combust.
