Fox Sports rebukes Skip Bayless for ‘insensitive’ Dak Prescott rant

Fox Sports couldn’t skip over this one. On Thursday’s “Undisputed,” the talking head Skip Bayless declared he felt “no sympathy” for Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott sharing his depression struggles. It was a take that spurred plenty of blowback, even from the network itself. “At FOX Sports, we are proud of Dak Prescott for publicly …

Fox Sports couldn’t skip over this one.

On Thursday’s “Undisputed,” the talking head Skip Bayless declared he felt “no sympathy” for Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott sharing his depression struggles.

It was a take that spurred plenty of blowback, even from the network itself.

“At FOX Sports, we are proud of Dak Prescott for publicly revealing his struggle with depression and mental health,” Fox Sports said in a statement. “No matter the cause of the struggle, FOX Sports believes Dak showed tremendous courage which is evident in both his leadership on the Dallas Cowboys and in his character off the field. We do not agree with Skip Bayless’ opinion on Undisputed this morning. We have addressed the significance of this matter with Skip and how his insensitive comments were received by people internally at FOX Sports and our audience.”

On Wednesday, Prescott revealed on “In Depth with Graham Bensinger” he’d struggled with anxiety, depression and sleeplessness during the coronavirus pandemic, issues intensified when his brother Jace committed suicide.

A day later, Bayless, on his daily argument-based show with co-host Shannon Sharpe, couldn’t help himself when it came to discussing Prescott’s story.

“When it comes to the quarterback of a NFL team, you know this as well as I do or better than I do, it’s the ultimate leadership position in sports, am I right about that?,” Bayless said. “You are commanding an entire NFL franchise, what’s the roster at now, 53 guys? … And they’re all looking to you to be their CEO, to be in charge of the football team. Because of all that, I don’t have sympathy for him going public with ‘I got depressed, I suffered depression early in COVID, to the point that I couldn’t even go work out.’

“Look, he’s the quarterback of America’s Team, and you know and I know, this sport that you play, it is dog-eat-dog. It is no compassion, no quarter given on the football field. If you reveal publicly any little weakness, it can affect your team’s ability to believe in you in the toughest spots, and it definitely can encourage others on the other side to come after you. You throw an interception, you’re going to hear ‘You depressed, number four?’ That sort of thing. You get sacked, ‘How’d that feel? You getting down about it?’ You just can’t go public with it, in my humble opinion.”