Just when you thought things around Redskins Park couldn’t get any crazier this week, a national sex scandal is the latest controversy surrounding a team that is quickly spiraling the drain of rationality.
On Wednesday, it was BlackSportsOnline.com who first broke the story of a Twitter account that appeared to belong to Jessica McCloughan, the wife of Redskins General Manager Scot McCloughan, sending disparaging remarks and accusations towards ESPN-online’s Diana Russini.
The tweets accused Russini, who before joining ESPN spent a year in Washington covering the Redskins for NBC4, of apparently trading sexual acts for information.
It is an unfortunate and inexcusable reality that many dedicated and hard-working female sports journalists face similar slander throughout their careers, and usually it would be best practice to ignore them for the mud-slinging garbage that they typically are.
However this story is different. Here we have a General Manager’s wife not only outwardly accusing a reporter of highly inappropriate behaviour, but significantly more concerning is the accusation that the reporter is her husband’s “side chick”:
Oh, boy.
The implication that new Redskins General Manager Scot McCloughan is not only leaking information within the first 6 months of his job, but that he is in some sort of inproper relationship with said reporter is what changes this story from “social media nonsense” to “potentially huge football ramifications”.
Further embarrassing for the Redskins is that Senior Vice President for Communications Tony Wyllie publicly denied that the story was accurate shortly after it went online, said that the Twitter account was fake and that the team had referred the issue to NFL Security.
About an hour after that denial, the team then issued a statement from Jessica McCloughan that actually confirmed the account was hers and that the story was reported accurately.
“I deeply apologize for the disparaging remarks about an ESPN reporter on my personal Twitter account. The comment was unfounded and inappropriate, and I have the utmost respect for both the reporter and ESPN. I regret that my actions have brought undeserved negative attention to the Redskins organization and its leadership. My comments in no way reflect the opinions or attitudes of the organization and I regret that my behavior has in any way negatively impacted the team and its loyal fan base.”
The fact that this has blown up in several respected Redskins executives respective faces is hugely embarrassing to a team who has been desperately trying to convey an image of competent and responsible conduct.
There is simply no way that the team and indeed the NFL cannot act on this issue now. An accusation from a General Manager’s wife that he’s been having an affair with a reporter and leaking information to her is grounds for dismissal if corroborated.
As many poor-taste jokes as this story will no doubt inspire, the sad fact is that the potential ramifications from this scandal are massive.
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