Serious Fan Directs Foot Traffic Behind ESPN Broadcasters During Halftime Show

Stephen Douglas | Jun 17, 2024

A fan tried to stop people from walking behind the ESPN broadcast during halftime. / ESPN on ABC

The Boston Celtics took a 67-48 lead into halftime of Game 5 of the NBA Finals. The halftime show was pretty much by the book with the on-site NBA Countdown crew breaking down the action from the first half. Right before the third quarter started ABC came back from commercial to give Mike Breen, Doris Burke and JJ Redick some well-deserved facetime, which is standard operating procedure for most broadcasts.

What isn't standard is the dude sitting behind the desk who was very serious about directing traffic. As Breen welcomed viewers back from commercial a ticketholder walked behind the desk and was told to get down to stay out of the shot. He basically had to crawl to his seat.

No sooner had he passed by when another fan started to walk through the shot. The fan in the white shirt was having none of that and threw up his hand like a crossing guard and shouted "no!" Then he went back to staring into the camera.

DO NOT steal this man's camera time https://t.co/zn5Mlq6awj pic.twitter.com/UL0ArCfKbl

— CJ Fogler account may or may not be notable (@cjzero) June 18, 2024

Some people assume he just wanted his own facetime, but it's possible he just didn't want to distract from whatever Breen, Burke and Redick had to say. Burke is the first woman to call a major men's championship in US history. And Redick? Well, he might be the next coach of the Los Angeles Lakers, which is basically the most important job in all of sports.

Whatever that fellow's motivations were, it made for a much more distracting scene than a few people walking by in the background without getting pushed or shouted at.