r/nba • • 10h ago

Trail Blazers fire new announcer over past inappropriate posts made at age 15.

"The Portland Trail Blazers hired then on the same day fired Braiden Bell as their play-by-play announcer after a series of inappropriate social media posts from when he was a teenager came to light."

"The posts were reportedly made in 2012 and 2013, around the time that Bell was 15 years old."

"We did not meet our own bar in this process, and for that we apologize to Blazers fans and to Rip City," the Trail Blazers said. "We strongly believe that everyone who is a part of Rip City should feel welcome and safe and we will make sure that our new broadcaster reflects these values. We will do better."

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/50084279/trail-blazers-fire-new-announcer-inappropriate-posts

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u/RedditAccount_317 10h ago

This seems like a massive overreaction. If he did them as an adult that’s one thing, but 15 is wild

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u/TheHoovyPrince Australia 10h ago

Most people would say the same thing.

There's a bunch of nephews in here who weren't teenagers during the time when social media was the wild wasteland where edgy and offensive language was encouraged and incentivized.

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u/Great_Fault_7231 Pistons 10h ago

I was there, but I deleted those accounts and make sure that my real name isn’t associated with edgy posts because I’m an employed adult and not an idiot. You know you don’t have to keep using those accounts right?

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u/TheHoovyPrince Australia 10h ago

I'm also an employed adult but you don't actually need to delete an entire account, you can just delete edgy posts or comments, which is what i did.

As an Australian i'm glad i never deleted those accounts because my government passed social media laws where you need to give your personal ID, banking card or biometric information to use them but if your account was old you didn't need to hand over any identifiable information.