Former NHL player and sports analyst Jeremy Roenick filed a lawsuit against NBC Sports alleging that the company fired him because he is straight.
The lawsuit, which was filed in the New York Supreme Court on Friday, claimed that Roenick was fired for making sexually explicit remarks while other NBC contributors who are gay were allowed to keep their jobs after similar conduct. Roenick claimed he was fired because he is an open supporter of President Trump and a straight man.
Roenick was fired after he joked about having a threesome with his wife and a coworker, Kathryn Tappen, while on the Barstool Sports podcast Spittin Chiclets in December. Roenick gave an explicit detail during the segment, saying, “I’m swimming with my wife and Kathryn, and they’ve got their bikinis on, and they look f—in’ smokin’. Ass and boobs everywhere. It’s great.”
Roenick apologized after the podcast aired and was fired shortly after making the apology. The lawsuit stated that NBC Sports violated Roenick’s contract because the network did not have good cause to fire him and did not provide him with a reasonable time to correct his behavior.
The lawsuit also noted that Tara Lipinski and Johnny Weir used vulgar language and claimed that two people were having an affair while providing figure skating coverage for NBC Sports but were not fired. Roenick has previously highlighted Weir’s comments as evidence of his discrimination. The former hockey player said that Weir “is gay and can say whatever.”
Roenick also claimed his support for Trump influenced his termination. He alleged that he asked his supervisor, Sam Flood, if he could speak at the 2016 Republican National Convention prior to Trump’s nomination. He was told that such a speech would reflect poorly on the company.
“I’m not saying what you can do. You know who you work for. You work for NBC. That would not look good on your NBC record,” Flood said, according to Roenick.
Roenick played in the NHL for eight seasons. He became an NBC Sports commentator in 2010.
