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Rachel Nichols made her first public appearance on Showtime since her departure from ESPN and said ‘at least one person’ decided to spy on her after she left new recording equipment on.
Nichols, 48, was recorded mid-conversation with Adam Mendelsohn, an advisor to many athletes like LeBron James, saying she believed Maria Taylor, 35, took over NBA Finals coverage in 2020 so that the network could promote diversity.
She explained on Showtime’s ‘All The Smoke’ podcast, hosted by former NBAers Stephen Jackson and Matt Barnes, that she was using new equipment and did not know she hadn’t turned off the line connecting her to ESPN’s Bristol headquarters.
‘At least one person decided to just sit and watch, and started spying on me like I was their own personal TV show,’ she said.
‘When they heard something they thought was juicy they picked up their phone and started recording my conversation.’
Nichols added that ESPN’s decision to move Nichols to a sideline reporter role and promote Taylor as host during the 2020 NBA playoffs was in response to a New York Times article questioning the network’s diversity opportunities.
Rachel Nichols, 48, says she believes she was spied on during a 2020 conversation with ‘friend’ Adam Mendelsohn, which later lead to her departure from ESPN
The conversation indicated that Nichols believed Maria Taylor (pictured) was promoted during ESPN’s NBA Finals coverage so that the network could promote diversity
While providing the context for why she was having the conversation with Mendelsohn, whom Nichols called ‘a friend,’ she added that hosting the NBA Finals was included in her contract with ESPN.
‘He brought up the article that had been in the paper about the lack of opportunities for people of color at ESPN, and we started talking about how my situation may intersect with some of the race and gender history of a network that is well-documented and complicated,’ Nichols said.
The 2020 recording between Nichols and Mendelsohn was documented by the New York Times in an article which Nichols is shown lamenting Taylor’s increased coverage.
‘If you need to give her more things to do because you are feeling pressure about your crappy longtime record on diversity—which, by the way, I know personally from the female side of it—like, go for it,’ Nichols is heard saying.
‘Just find it somewhere else.’
After the article was published, Taylor left ESPN for NBC where she serves as a sportscaster and host of ‘Football Night in America.’
On Showtime’s ‘All The Smoke’ podcast, Nichols said no wrongdoing was found in the recording and she was disciplined only after it went public
Nichols, who hosted ESPN’s ‘The Jump’ in addition to its live NBA broadcasts, said more context was not included as the recording was publicly circulated
Nichols and ESPN parted ways in 2021, leading to Nichols joining Showtime Sport’s NBA coverage in 2022
During the conversation, Nichols said it was not documented that she had called Taylor ‘incredibly talent’ and wished her ‘all the success in the world.’
She continued, noting a portion of the conversation in which Nichols said Rece Davis, who hosts ‘College GameDay,’ would not be asked to become a sideline reporter for the same reasons.
‘I have fought through a lot of things in this business to get to where I am,’ she said.
‘To me, it felt like, ‘Hey, if you have a problem, if it is this article, if it is something else, whatever it is, why are you coming to the two women here to solve it?’
ESPN’s HR did not find any wrongdoing in its investigation of the recording, according to Nichols, who then received a new contract while Taylor was promoted.
‘I think there were still some people who had bad feelings and they held on to this tape for a year,’ she said, ‘When there was a point that they wanted some leverage with their own situations, they fed it to the press.’
Taylor, 35, left ESPN shortly after the recording was reported on for NBC, where she now works as a sportscaster and host of ‘Football Night in America’
Nichols said she believes Taylor is ‘incredibly talented’ and wished her ‘all the success in the world’
Nichol’s show, ‘The Jump,’ was canceled in 2021 and was then removed from all NBA programming.
When a recording of the call leaked and started to circulate among ESPN employees, it prompted a crisis with several of the network’s top talent contemplating a refusal to appear on the air in protest.
It also caused anger among black employees at the network who felt that the secretly recorded conversation was a more accurate reflection of white attitudes about diversity.
The anger boiled over when it became apparent that ESPN President Jimmy Pitaro would not discipline Nichols despite the demands from employees that he do so.
The only individual known to be punished was Kayla Johnson, a black digital video producer who reportedly told human resources that she sent the video to Taylor.
Johnson was suspended for two weeks without pay and was later given less desirable tasks at work. She left ESPN in 2021 along with other black employees who felt mistreated by the network.
One year removed from her leaving ESPN, Nichols has since been hired by Showtime Sports to contribute to the network’s growing NBA coverage.
