Atlanta Braves Reporter Slammed for Getting Girl’s Quantity Throughout Broadcast

Social media extensively condemned an Atlanta Braves broadcast staff who turned a fan interview right into a pick-up scheme throughout the staff’s recreation in opposition to the Toronto Blue Jays.

Braves sideline reporter Wiley Ballard was interviewing two ladies within the crowd at Toronto’s Rogers Centre on Monday, April 14 when his broadcast colleagues started encouraging him to get the ladies’s numbers.

Ballard, who works for FanDuel Sports activities Community, initially concluded his interview with the ladies — who mentioned their names have been Lauren and Kayla — by saying he was “gonna go to work right here” whereas the play-by-play announcers received again to the sport.

“Okay, Wiley, you’ve received 4 innings to get the numbers,” Braves announcer Brandon Gaudin instructed Wiley, in line with a video of the interview shared on social media.

“Alright, so they need me to get your quantity,” Ballard then instructed the ladies, pulling out his cellphone. 

The ladies, who couldn’t hear Ballard’s colleagues egging him on, responded with suspicion: “They need you to get my quantity?” the lady named Lauren replied.

“I’m useless critical!” Ballard responded, pointing to his ear piece. “She doesn’t consider me. She thinks I’m making this up. Even in case you guys weren’t…I’d use that sooner or later, that’s really a reasonably good transfer.”

The Braves broadcast analyst C.J. Nitkowski then joked that males ought to stroll round baseball stadiums with a microphone and an earpiece and ask for ladies’s cellphone numbers. “This may be the brand new transfer,” he mentioned.

Many sports activities reporters later took to social media to slam Wiley and the Braves broadcast crew for the stunt.

“This is among the most insanely inappropriate issues I’ve ever seen. Like I legitimately can not consider it’s actual,” CBS MLB editor Katie Feldman posted.

“Think about if a feminine reporter did something like this. Profession over,” Washington Publish sports activities reporter Chelsea Janes wrote. “Fairly brutal to see it glorified by the printed.”

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Dallas Morning Information baseball reporter Evan Grant wrote that the state of affairs confirmed “it’s not the identical for each sexes,” including that the incident was “inherently unsuitable.”

“If a feminine sideline/dugout reporter did this‚ she’d be referred to as horrible names and possibly be run out of city,” Grant wrote.

Others defended Ballard, who took to social media to rejoice getting the lady’s quantity by posting a meme from Good Will Searching.

“Instance #28495 why males get away with the underside of the barrel content material as a result of misogyny is alive and properly in sports activities tv,” CBS Detroit sports activities anchor Rachel Hopmayer added. “A lady might by no means and would by no means with out shedding their job over this. Lazy, disappointing, offensive, grimey, I might go on. Yikes throughout.”