Last weekend Georgia athletic department intern Chamberlain Smith was injured in a nasty collision on the sideline. In the aftermath, CBS broadcaster Gary Danielson proceeded to laugh, joke, and generally fail to grasp what was happening, leading to a very uncomfortable stretch of television.
Today, as CBS came on the air for Georgia-Texas A&M, CBS reporter Jamie Erdahl provided an update on Smith’s condition, reporting Smith is recovering at home and watching the game, which Smith herself had tweeted earlier.
Me & my black eye will be cheering on the dawgs from the safety of my living room today!! See y’all on the sidelines again soon ❤️ pic.twitter.com/PwPoJC29JN
— Chamberlain Smith (@ChamberlainSmit) November 23, 2019
After that update from Erdahl, Brad Nessler teed up Danielson for an apology, essentially saying he had no idea what was happening.
In real-time, I just didn’t see what happened. In fact I might have been the last person to see what happened. That confusion and my commentary that followed led some to conclude I was being insensitive to Chamberlain’s serious situation. That certainly wasn’t my intent. But I did. That it happened and our viewers saw it, simply put: I should have been better. I want to apologize to Chamberlain and our CBS viewers for that.
An apology is certainly better than no apology, and Danielson certainly needed to apologize. It’s tough to hear any kind of equivocation; someone was clearly hurt, after all. Still, he apologized, and more importantly, Smith seems to be making a quick recovery.
About Jay Rigdon
Jay is a columnist at Awful Announcing. He is not a strong swimmer. He is probably talking to a dog in a silly voice at this very moment.