A dirty dozen years at ESPN for Sean Salisbury -- gone
Without a real press-release kinda statement from ESPN, an email sent out by the WWLeader today indicates that former NFL and USC quarterback Sean Salisbury , a studio analyst on the NFL for the last dozen years, has been sent on his way.
The strangly worded terse statement released by ESPN (without attribution to anyone in particular):
"Sean Salisbury has made many contributions to our efforts for the past 12 years. We thank him and wish him all the best."
And a statement ESPN has released on Salisbury's behalf:
"I want to thank ESPN for 12 great years of talking football on TV and the radio. I have grown as much as I can at ESPN and decided to expand my horizons. I have created a brand and it’s time to expand into other opportunities in TV, radio, Internet, publishing, movies and public speaking, among others. My resume speaks for itself as a football analyst, and I believe I can talk all sports with the best of them.”
We went to the site that seemed to be Salisbury's official Internet home -- SeanBigMouthSalisbury.com -- but the site doesn't seem to be working.... Gone, too?
This sorta link is still hanging around on a MySpace.com profile. He's also got a foundation website, but that tells nothing further.
From the way ESPN released this information -- about 3 hours after it also announced that former NFL receiver and HBO "Inside the NFL" analyst Cris Carter was joining the network -- it leads us to believe that a reporter following up on the later discovered the former, and asked an ESPN official about it. That led to a scramble of sorts to explain why Salisbury was a) fired, b) not rehired or c) mutually agreed to split.
Still, if you're looking for a deeper understanding of this, perhaps a recent exchange between Salisbury and fellow NFL reporter/sparring partner John Clayton was a contributing factor? AOL Fan House can document that one for you.
There's also the wildy reported suspension Salisbury reportedly received from ESPN for ... well, Deadspin.com can fill you in. Salisbury told us after that report that, without denying it, he didn't read Internet stuff and don't believe everything you read.
Carter will be used, meanwhile, as another time filler on "NFL Live," as well as other proported news shows.
“Cris is a Hall of Fame caliber player and a tremendous analyst, and we are thrilled to welcome him to ESPN where he will give fans a true insider’s perspective on the NFL year-round across our various platforms,” said Norby Williamson, ESPN executive vice president of production.
Attempts to reach Salisbury so far have not been successful.
When ESPN announced Carter's hiring today, it concluded the press release with this paragraph:
"Carter is the latest addition to ESPN’s impressive roster of NFL studio analysts, which includes Mike Ditka, Merril Hoge, Tom Jackson, Keyshawn Johnson, Mark Schlereth, Emmitt Smith, Steve Young and others."
Others, apparently not including Salisbury, who, according to one ESPN radio website, is the love child of Gary Busey and pro golfer Scott Hoch. We don't make this stuff up, we just report it.