ESPN anchor Jorge Andres issued an apology for a remark about Jeremy Lin made during a Thursday night episode of "SportsCenter." Discussing Lin's performance against the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden, Andres said the Rockets’ point guard “was cooking with some hot peanut oil."


As peanut oil is widely used in Asian cuisine, the comment was interpreted as a reference to Lin's ethnicity. Lin, who sparked "Linsanity" during his breakout 2011-2012 season with the Knicks, is the NBA's first American-born player of Taiwanese descent. Andres, who joined the network in 2011, soon issued an apology on air.


“Earlier in this show I made a comment about a Jeremy Lin basket that I should not have made,” Andres said. “This was clearly a poor choice of words. I sincerely apologize. I am very, very sorry for offending anyone, that was never my intention.”


In addition to issuing a subsequent apology via Twitter, Andres attempted to explain the inspiration for his comment. Andres claimed that his remark was a reference to "Duck Dynasty."




Regarding the "Duck Dynasty" defense, Matt Yoder of Awful Announcing noted that Andres could have been a bit more mindful of context before dropping the reference.


"There's a right and a wrong time to use lines you may have at your disposal and clearly ESPN felt this was the wrong time for that particular line as they had Andres apologize within the hour," wrote Yoder on Friday.


As noted by Deadspin, Andres was the anchor who apologized on air in February 2012 after ESPN's Max Bretos used the phrase "chink in the armor" while discussing possible weaknesses in Lin's game. Bretos was suspended for his choice of words. During that same month, ESPN fired an editor who used that same phrase as the headline to promote a story about a Knicks' loss on mobile platforms.


[H/T Deadspin]


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