Bill Simmons fired by ESPN

Bill Simmons bashed Roger Goodell one day before ESPN announced his departure

ESPN president John Skipper says Bill Simmons’ exit had nothing to do with his harsh words for Roger Goodell last fall, in which he called the NFL commissioner “a liar” and then dared his bosses to suspend him for saying it. So it has to be a wild coincidence that 24 hours after Simmons bashed Goodell again, this time for concealing the contents of the Wells Report (which just so happened to be about Simmons’ favorite team and quarterback), ESPN announced their partnership with Simmons was over.

As noted by The Big Lead, Simmons was a guest on The Dan Patrick Show on Thursday when the report came up during the interview. Patrick was arguing, and Simmons was agreeing, that the NFL was wagging the dog on the Wells Report and waiting to make suspensions or fines based on public sentiment. This is what politicians do all the time. But to Simmons, it was a nefarious use of power given his bizarre anti-Goodell fervor. (Emphasis added.)

“I’ll go further than you. I think it’s pathetic. He has handled so many things so badly — Roger Goodell — that it’s reached a point now where you have something like this, where it took four months to release the report, and he knew everything that was in it. He knows the results before the report is released to the public, and yet doesn’t have the testicular fortitude to do anything until he gauges the public reaction.”

Taking the public’s temperature is just smart business. It’s what Adam Silver, a commissioner Simmons seems to worship, did with his quick reaction in the Donald Sterling case. Why this is any different, who knows? It’s just part of Simmons deep contempt for the NFL commissioner, I suppose.

For most of the past year, Simmons has seemed to want to be a modern-day Woodward and Bernstein, toppling the Goodell-ian NFL empire with his words. Now he’ll be free to do that someplace else.