ESPN FIRES WRITER FOR HEADLINE PUN ABOUT JEREMY LIN

So many puns and racial asides have accompanied reports about New York Knicks star Jeremy Lin’s sensational start that it all became the centerpiece of a Saturday Night Live sketch this weekend. Using a “Sports Center” type of background, the faux panelists discussed the firing of an ESPN writer for writing the headline “A Chink in the Armor” for an online story about the Knicks’ loss to the New Orleans Hornets on Friday. Two black panelists joined in the punning until a white member began making similar comments about blacks. (The white member was removed before the sketch was over.) ESPN was not laughing. “We are conducting a complete review of our cross-platform editorial procedures and are determining appropriate disciplinary action to ensure this does not happen again. We regret and apologize for this mistake,” it said in a statement. Apparently such racialisms do not carry the same affront in other cultures and languages that they do here. A famous Asian restaurant in Cannes that attracts visitors to the city’s film festival each year is called Chink’s.