ESPN Used Fake Names To Get On-Air Personalities Emmy Awards
In what can only be described as one of the strangest stories in recent memory, ESPN personalities have recently been asked to return the ill-gotten Emmy Awards they were given.
The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (NATAS), the organization that hands out the Emmys, uncovered a scheme by ESPN to acquire more than 30 of the iconic statuettes for on-air talent who were ineligible to win the awards.
Since at least 2010, the network inserted fake names in Emmy entries and took the awards won by those imaginary individuals. The company then had them re-engraved and gave them to on-air personalities.
The Scheme Has Been Going on For Years
Among those who were given these ill-gotten Emmys included Kirk Herbstreit, Lee Corso, Desmond Howard, Chris Fowler, and Samantha Ponder. There is no evidence that the personalities knew about the scheme.
“I think it was really crummy what they did to me and others,” said Shelley Smith, a 26-year ESPN veteran who was asked to return one of her Emmys.
The fraud was discovered by the NATAS, which prompted an investigation by the organization and ESPN.
At this time, it is not known who orchestrated the scheme. Craig Lazarus, vice president and executive producer of original content and features, and Lee Fitting, a senior vice president of production who oversaw College GameDay, were among the ESPN employees ruled ineligible from future Emmy participation.
ESPN Responds
In a statement, ESPN admitted that the fraud took place.
“Some members of our team were clearly wrong in submitting certain names that may go back to 1997 in Emmy categories where they were not eligible for recognition or statuettes. This was a misguided attempt to recognize on-air individuals who were important members of our production team,” they said.
“Once current leadership was made aware, we apologized to NATAS for violating guidelines and worked closely with them to completely overhaul our submission process to safeguard against anything like this happening again. We brought in outside counsel to conduct a full and thorough investigation and individuals found to be responsible were disciplined by ESPN.”
Why Create the Scheme?
The creation of the ESPN scheme was spurred on by the NAATAS guideline that ruled that on-air talent could not win awards for an individual feature aired on programs such as College GameDay.
The rule was implemented to prevent talent from winning two awards for the same work. The NATAS rulebook called such wins “double-dipping.”
To circumvent these rules, ESPN inserted fake names into the credit list it submitted for College GameDay. The names were similar to the names of on-air personalities and had identical initials. The imaginary names were given the title of “associate producer.”
Among the names used included Kirk Henry (Kirk Herbstreit), Lee Clark (Lee Corso), Dirk Howard (Desmond Howard), and Tim Richard (Tom Rinaldi), who appeared in all seven years. Steven Ponder (Sam Ponder) and Gene Wilson (Gene Wojciechowski).
With a recent change to NATAS rules, on-air personalities are now eligible to win for individual features. Still, the latest findings show a decades-long conspiracy to placate ESPN talent with fake awards.
What a strange, strange story.
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