Skip to main content

The reason ESPN reportedly firedBaseball Tonight host, Adnan Virk, last Friday was because he leaked information to the website, Awful Announcing.

New York Post sports media reporter, Andrew Marchand, who broke the news of Virk's termination, appeared Monday on the Sports Illustrated Media Podcast and shared full details of the strange story.

"The feelling was that Adnan had been leaking information and on this occasion, acccording to my sources, he pre-emptively told Awful Annoucing reporter Ben Koo about a conference call [ESPN] was having about baseball and then [Virk] missed some of the call and so then after he followed up with the senior coordinating for baseball at ESPN, Phil Orleans, and he asked him pointed quesions that weren't actually in the conference call and then that information ended up on Awful Announcing's website later that day, so it tipped off ESPN," Marchand told SI Media Podcast host, Jimmy Traina. "So they did an investigation and they felt like Adnan wasn't truthful or forthcoming when they figured out what happened. It's unclear if he'd been truthful if he would've kept his job, but it probably would've helped."

Virk, who was in the first year of a four-year deal, is not getting paid for the remainder of his contract or receiving a severance and is expected to pursue legal action against ESPN.

"The Virk side feels there should've been a warning first," said Marchand. "From there, you make good of things. Usually in contracts at ESPN, you have some sort of language where if you do something wrong, you're allowed to correct that wrongdoing. That was definitely their view of how things should've gone down.  ESPN's view is that they give you all kinds of compliance training, especially about classified information, and you're not supposed to leak it. There's your warning. that's why Adnan Virk is looking at Connecticut lawyers to see what kind of suit he'd have."

In addition to hosting Baseball Tonight, Virk worked on college football and college basketball coverage for ESPN.