It was all “bulls–t,” according to Pat McAfee.
The Athletic’s Andrew Marchand reported Thursday that McAfee had “essentially banned” Adam Schefter from McAfee’s self-titled program after the ESPN NFL insider was unavailable for a free agency show in March.
Well, the rumors were cleared up later on Thursday when Schefter made his first appearance on “The Pat McAfee Show” in three months.
“I learned a lot about my business this morning in another article,” McAfee said on air. “Seems like that happens all the time. I don’t know if it’s just normal, par for the course, I guess it’s just life these days. There’s so many of them it’s hard to keep track of, but when that rat writes something, it is nice to just be like: ‘Well that’s bullsh-t,’ immediately.”
McAfee’s frustrations with the report led to the perfect introduction for Schefter to the show.
“Joining us now: a banned man,” McAfee welcomed him.
Schefter was clearly unconcerned with the report.
“Pat, as I was saying when I was so rudely interrupted three months ago,” he joked just after being welcomed on air. “Aaron Rodgers is gonna sign with the Pittsburgh Steelers.”
It was a humorous entrance for the NFL insider, but it did put into perspective how long ago it had been since Schefter, typically a frequent guest on the show, had made an appearance.
His last appearance was at the beginning of NFL free agency.
Now, Rodgers has finally signed after he waited about as long as he possibly could to sign with the Steelers.
In Schefter’s time away from the show, McAfee welcomed NFL Network’s insider Ian Rapoport numerous times, which aided in the swirling of the rumors that McAfee was upset with Schefter.
In response to The Athletic’s report about the alleged drama, ESPN president of content Burke Magnus said that “Pat and his show are thriving on ESPN,” and “We’ve continuously seen those out there that are seemingly obsessed with wanting to see Pat fail on ESPN. This rumor is just the latest example of that.”