Late Friday afternoon, Awful Announcing posted the news that ESPN midday national sports radio host Clinton Yates was out at ESPN.
The news came as a surprise, particularly because Awful Announcing also reported that Yates was no longer part of Andscape.
“That’s showbiz, kiddos. Happy Friday,” wrote Yates in response to the news.
Yates joined ESPN in 2016 as part of the editorial team at The Undefeated, which rebranded as Andscape a few years later. His presence then grew across the network through shows like Around the Horn and ESPN Daily.
In late January 2025, ESPN announced Yates would host his own national radio show Clinton & Friends weekdays from 10am – 12pm ET. The network revealed Yates’ show would be followed by Joe & Q from 12pm – 3pm ET and the already successful Freddie & Harry, hosted by Freddie Coleman and Harry Douglas from 3 – 6pm ET.
A little over a year later, Clinton & Friends and Joe & Q are both gone, the latter replaced by The Rich Eisen Show.
This news, coupled with the end of The JR Sports Brief Show on CBS Sports Radio this past December, exposes a serious issue.
What’s happening to the Black national sports radio host?
Aside from Freddie & Harry, Chris Canty on ESPN’s Unsportsmanlike and Fox Sports Radio’s The Odd Couple with Rob Parker and Kelvin Washington and LaVar Arrington on 2 Pros and a Cup of Joe, Black national sports radio hosts appear to be disappearing from the airwaves.
And that’s particularly true of those who aren’t former professional athletes.
There are strong Black voices across other genres such as politics, community affairs, health/wellness and entertainment, but sports is sorely lacking that same strong presence.
At one time, prominent Black sports voices could be heard on airwaves across the country.
Names like Sherman “Jocko” Maxwell, Art Rust Jr., Fred Hickman, Dave Simms, The 2 Live Stews and later Stephen A. Smith were prominent voices keeping sports fans, particularly Black sports fans, informed across the country.
Many moved on to successful television careers while others moved to local radio or play by play, all of which is great.
But with those moves came the loss of their well respected voices on national radio which has created a void in an area that was once a great training ground for Black sports journalists to cultivate their talents.
Radio used to be the most influential media platform in Black America, where trusted Black voices could be heard sharing information and having discussions crucial to the community.
It still remains an influential presence across the country, particularly through programming like Sirius XM’s Urban View channel, The Black Information Network, Urban One and community radio stations like City College’s WHCR 90.3 FM in Harlem and Philly’s WURD.
There are Black sports radio hosts in local markets, but not nearly as many as there should be, particularly in major cities like New York, Boston and Philadelphia.
And the failure to have Black journalists in these seats is sometimes based on ridiculous and harmful assumptions.
“These stations make the assumption that we [Black hosts] can’t be objective when critiquing Black athletes,” O.J. Spivey of the Philly Tribune told me. “That’s completely contradictory to what we [Black journalists] have worked hard to do.”
In 2024, longtime sports journalist and Black Sports Writers Hall of Fame Class of 2026 inductee Rob Parker launched Sports Rap Radio AM 1270 in Detroit, the first all Black sports radio network.
“It’s going to be sports talk radio. We’re not reinventing the wheel,” Parker told me in our interview a few months before launch. “But the perspectives and narratives will be different.”
The idea, mission and lineup were great; unfortunately, a lack of funding, which often plagues many Black media companies, forced the cessation of operations a few months after launch.
The latest area of success for Black voices has been in podcasting, yet that avenue has primarily leaned towards Black athletes, not journalists.
So as radio formats, audiences and distribution have all changed in response to shifts in factors like consumption habits, an evolving media landscape and the general war on Black culture that we’ve currently experiencing, Black sports voices on national platforms have declined.
And that’s particularly true for Black women.
Fortunately, local radio remains a powerful platform for Black sports talent to engage and interact with audiences like they’ve done for decades. In many cases, local connections can be denser and more influential and powerful than national ones.
Hosts like Kelsey Nicole Nelson and her show “Listen in with KNN” are proving that.
In these times, it’s crucial to control the narrative and provide culturally relevant perspectives, particularly in sports where coverage can sometimes be disrespectful and a lack of representation can often be glaring i.e. the NFL’s hiring cycle this past offseason.
“That’s the reason why Sports Rap Radio was started,” Parker told me.
A perfect example is the incident that took place with Carl Banks and WFAN hosts Brandon Tierney and Sal Licata concerning the Giants Kayvon Thibodeaux. During their heated on-air debate, they hung up on the Giants legend and WFAN play-by-play host, after which he resigned from the station.
Listening to mainstream sports talk radio and podcasts, you hear similar voices, practices and styles. And when it comes to discussions around coaching, those same voices frustratingly circulate the same names.
This cyclical system, Spivey noted during our conversation, aids in the erasure of Black voices.
This is why it’s so important to recognize what’s happening in sports media and focus on attracting and developing more Black voices for national and local sports radio broadcasts, which is something Parker has a keen focus on doing.
“We need Black voices on radio, and I’m proud we have that on Fox Sports Radio,” Parker said. “And they’re not just former [pro] athletes.”
His focus on opening the door for others demonstrates the responsibility those currently in the chairs have to cultivate the next generation.
“I looked at a guy like Keith McPherson, who’s talented and needed a platform,” said Parker of the former WFAN NY sports radio host. “So I gave him one.”
Black athletes also share in that responsibility in that they shouldn’t ignore Black media during interviews. They need to be conscious of who their reps are pushing them towards and, more importantly, who they are dismissing or ignoring.
Finally we, as a mass collective, must take action and become those voices so that we don’t lose our place, significance and narrative in the sports ecosystem.
And that voice can have a powerful start on air.
