Glen Kuiper, the primary play-by-play broadcaster for the Oakland Athletics, has been fired following an internal review triggered when he said a racial slur on air.
“Following an internal review, the decision has been made for NBC Sports California to end its relationship with Glen Kuiper, effective immediately,” the network said in a statement on Monday. “We thank Glen for his dedication to Bay Area baseball over the years.”
During a May 5 baseball broadcast before the Oakland A’s faced the Kansas City Royals, Kuiper spoke of his trip to the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City. But he instead called it the “N****r League Museum.”
(A video clip of the incident that includes the uncensored slur is below.)
“A little earlier in the show, I said something, didn’t come out the way I wanted it to,” Kuiper said later in the broadcast. “I just wanted to apologize if it sounded different than I meant it to be said.”
The following day, Kuiper said he “could not be more sorry and horrified of what I said.”
The A’s said at the time that Kuiper’s language was “unacceptable.” NBC Sports California suspended Kuiper indefinitely right after the remark and said the network would conduct an internal review.
“This decision was based on a variety of factors, including information uncovered in the internal review,” a person familiar with the probe told The Athletic and The Associated Press. Neither outlet reported what that new information specifically was.
The 60-year-old announcer had been calling the A’s games for 20 years. He is also the younger brother of former MLB player and San Francisco Giants announcer Duane Kuiper.
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