Ex-NFL reporter doesn’t buy ESPN’s justification for firing Sam Ponder: ‘They clearly’ wanted her gone

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ESPN fires Sam Ponder, citing budget cuts

Former NFL sideline reporter Michele Tafoya discusses ESPN's move to fire 'Sunday NFL Countdown' host Samantha Ponder, arguing the decision was 'mistreatment.'

ESPN fired reporter Sam Ponder on Thursday, citing budget cuts, but former sports reporters are pointing to her strong stance on fairness in women's sports as evidence of their motive to cut ties.  

Michele Tafoya, a former NFL sideline reporter, who left the industry in 2022, weighed in on the firing of Ponder on "America's Newsroom" on Friday. 

"I don't believe that anything is just budget cuts anymore," Tafoya said. "I think that they clearly wanted to find an off-ramp for Sam. What's troubling to me is the timing. This is three weeks before the NFL season begins. Her show ‘Sunday NFL Countdown’ is coming off its best ratings year in quite some time, so I don't know why they would do this so close to the season and bring so much attention, unless they want to bring in the next host and give that host a lot of attention. But what Sam said in that tweet was so reasonable."

Ponder was among a small group of sports reporters who have publicly called for fairness in women’s sports amid the ongoing debate over transgender inclusion. 

Sam Ponder (Getty Images)

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"Call me whatever names you want, but it doesn't change the fact that it is inherently unfair for biological males to compete in female sports," Ponder tweeted in 2023. "It's literally the reason they were separate in the first place, and the reason we need Title IX."

Former football player Robert Griffin III was also fired the same day as Ponder and both of them still had time left on their contracts, which will have to be bought out, Tafoya said. Ponder was an anchor on "Sunday NFL Countdown" and Griffin was an analyst who appeared on multiple shows. 

Tafoya also objected to characterizations of Ponder as bigoted, such as by USA Today columnist Nancy Armour.

"There's a USA Today columnist named Nancy Armour who came out after Sam and said she's a bigot," Tafoya said. "Sam Ponder is the furthest thing from a bigot that I've ever met. So this is mistreatment again. It kind of rings the same as what happened to say Sage Steele," who left ESPN in April 2022. 

Steele filed a lawsuit against ESPN alleging the network violated her free speech rights after she was punished in 2021 for speaking out against parent company Disney's COVID vaccine mandate and knocked former President Obama for identifying as Black, instead of biracial like she is. They settled the lawsuit, and she left the network last August.

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"I've talked to men and women in sports who are still in it, right, and they have said, 'Oh, I got to be careful about my brand,' is what I have heard from most of them. So that's troubling to me," Tafoya said. 

"This is such basic common sense," she added. "This has nothing to do with bigotry. It has to do with fairness and biology, by the way."

Samantha Ponder speaks at Inside the Game Q&A presented by IFA on February 2, 2018 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Thaddaeus McAdams/WireImage)

Tafoya said no one is trying to deny a transgender athlete's ability to compete. 

"It's just where do you compete, in what lane? I was a little kid when Title IX was passed," she said. "My dad had a son and three daughters. He was so excited for us. He said, 'You're going to have opportunities that your mom never had, that my sisters never had,' and he was right. And by the way, Dana, I think that I had a long career in sportscasting as a woman thanks to Title IX."

A source familiar with Ponder and Griffin’s firings previously told Fox News Digital they were business decisions. Griffin was off of "Monday Night Countdown" in favor of the network's new hire, former Philadelphia Eagles center Jason Kelce, and was still going to receive his full salary for a low-profile college football show. Ponder’s lone show was "Sunday NFL Countdown."

The source added that Ponder and Griffin will still get what they are owed in their contracts.

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Fox News' Ryan Gaydos and Jospeh Wulfsohn contributed to this report.