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Lynn Farah

From stints at the Kansas City Star to ESPN, Jason Whitlock, 58, is a sports pundit who’s won awards for his commentary. But he’s also courted much controversy.
In recent years, Whitlock has transitioned to politics, even bagging his own podcast on the conservative Blaze Media network – which was founded by ex-Fox News host Glenn Beck.












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A post shared by Jason Whitlock (@realjasonwhitlock)



No stranger to making controversial statements, Whitlock made headlines last year when he said the WNBA was reliant on men and the success of the NBA. Ratings for the WNBA plummeted after star player Caitlin Clark ended her rookie season, sparking debate about the impact one person can have. Notably, Whitlock claimed that WNBA was “living off the charity of the NBA”.
Here’s what to know about Jason Whitlock.
He has loved sport since childhood












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A post shared by Jason Whitlock (@realjasonwhitlock)



In a piece published on the The Shirley Povich Centre for Sports Journalism’s platform, Whitlock described how he played football, basketball and was good at track as a child. He said he had a happy childhood, even though his parents split when he was about four or five. Whitlock said he was always an Indiana Pacers fan and growing up there was no ESPN, which meant he had to keep up with his team through the local newspaper.
Whitlock became an avid reader of the sports section and when he got a football scholarship to Ball State University, his plan was to be an accountant. “A friend said ‘Hey, dude, you love sports, you love reading the sports section, you should become a sportswriter.’ And so I switched my major first semester of freshman year to journalism.”
He’s known for his work in sports journalism

Whitlock catapulted to fame as one of America’s most prominent sports reporters while working at the Kansas City Star from 1994 to 2010. He was known for speaking about race, social media and sports, with his work scooping numerous awards, including the Scripps Howard National Journalism Award for Commentary in 2008.
He became a household name with his ESPN site The Undefeated and his Fox Sport show Speak for Yourself. In 2015 Whitlock was inducted into the Indiana Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association Hall of Fame, earning recognition for his contribution to sports journalism. Per ESPN, Whitlock paid tribute to his mentor, Bob Hammel explaining how Hammel took him in as a part-time writer in 1990.
He’s now a conservative commentator

Whitlock now has a popular podcast on the Blaze Media network, Fearless with Jason Whitlock. On Blaze’s website, the description reads that he and his cast “protect the realm of common sense and challenge the groupthink mandated by elites”.
Since then, he’s spoken about topics such as masculinity, claiming that men in sports were being emasculated, and has also often made anti-trans comments.
He’s no stranger to controversy

An outspoken sports journalist who is now known as a conservative political commentator, Whitlock says the role of media and journalists is to make people uncomfortable. “We should be a thorn in the side of the very comfortable people in our society. It’s not because we hate them, it’s just too much power and money and influence leads to corruption. We need to be that system of checks and balances, and so I tend to fight up,” Whitlock said per the Povich Centre.
Whitlock’s fame escalated when he worked at ESPN and after leaving, he was known for critiquing them. He said he was the “thorn in ESPN’s side” because it was “the world’s most powerful institution in sports and it needed to be questioned by someone with stature and credibility”.
What did he say about the Don Imus saga?

Back in 2007, radio host Don Imus famously called the Rutgers University women’s basketball players “nappy-headed hos”, sparking debate over how women in sport were openly demeaned. Imus lost his job. Whitlock “thanked” Imus, saying that the real problem was hip hop culture, which portrayed women as “hos”, and that Imus gave the Black community an excuse to “avoid our real problem”.
“I was on Oprah Winfrey and things like that. And a lot of people didn’t like it, particularly in the Black community. They thought I had sold out, but, it’s what I believed,” Whitlock said.


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Last year, Whitlock said the WNBA was ‘living off the charity of the NBA’ after Caitlin Clark’s season ended – he’s also made controversial comments about efforts to ‘emasculate men’


Last year, Whitlock said the WNBA was ‘living off the charity of the NBA’ after Caitlin Clark’s season ended – he’s also made controversial comments about efforts to ‘emasculate men’.
