Don’t twist Kirk Herbstreit’s words.
The ESPN college football analyst was caught on a hot mic firstly of the fourth quarter of TCU’s 48-14 beatdown of North Carolina saying, “You’re bad,” while letting out a loud groan.
Herbstreit’s comment raised some eyebrows during an otherwise boring game in Bill Belichick’s Tar Heels coaching debut, and went viral after each the Bartstool X account and the X account for the favored Barstool podcast “Pardon My Take” posted the audio.
He first quote tweeted the “Pardon My Take” post, which had the caption, “They’re bad,” with the implication being that Herbstreit made the remark a few North Carolina team that trailed, 41-14, at home entering the fourth quarter.
“(I) Said ‘you’re bad’ to my spotter Deron for something he said as we were coming back on air. Manipulation at its finest!” Herbstreit wrote at 12:01 a.m. ET.
Seven minutes later, he went after the Bartstool post that read, “‘They’re bad.’ Kirk Herbstreit got caught on the recent mic.”
“Have to be a slow night..unsure why that is so confusing,” Herbstreit wrote. “I said ‘YOU’RE bad’ to my spotter Deron for something funny he said once we were just coming back on air.”
Herbstreit later added that calling blowouts like Monday’s game is incredibly difficult when the rating is so lopsided with quarter-hour remaining.
“As an alternative of creating up things I said how bout giving Rece (Davis), Holly (Rowe), and I some love for getting through that game –- those games are by far the hardest games you announcers need to call,” he posted.
He also retweeted a post from Tony Granieri, a spotter for ESPN, who tweeted that he stood three feet to Herbstreit’s right within the booth and the analyst indeed said “you’re bad.”
Folks ran with the audio after a much-hyped North Carolina debut for Belichick as a substitute changed into one in every of the ugliest losses of his profession.
North Carolina had a well-scripted first drive where it scored a touchdown to grab a 7-0 lead before things totally unraveled from there.
The Tar Heels had an uneven performance on each side of the ball, but their quarterback play was especially troubling.
Gio Lopez accomplished just 4 of 10 passes for 69 yards and threw a terrible pick-six to bury them in the primary half, giving the Horned Frogs a 17-7 lead.
He was eventually benched for Max Johnson, who did a greater job in mop-up duty.
“Obviously, now we have plenty of work to do,” Belichick said postgame. “We want to do a greater job throughout — coaching, playing, all three phases of the sport. It wasn’t as much as what it must be. I do know we’re so much higher than that.
“They outplayed us, out-coached us, they usually were just higher than we were tonight. That’s all there was to it. They did so much more things right than we did. Give them credit for being the higher team.”
The Tar Heels are set to face Charlotte on Saturday of their next test.
