At the Television Critics Association summer press tour, Keith Olbermann said that he hasn’t been banned from talking about politics on his new ESPN2 late night talk show, but that doesn’t mean he actually will.
Olbermann made his appearance during the event Wednesday, a week after ESPN confirmed that it had signed the former Countdown host for Olbermann, a new late night show that will start on Aug. 26. The political pundit began his career in sports and worked at ESPN from 1992 to 1997.
According to The LA Times, Olbermann said that reports that ESPN banned him from talking about politics were wrong. “This is a sports show,” he noted, so don’t expect politics to come in anyway.
But that didn’t stop him from making fun of a particular politician during the event, notes the New York Daily News. He had to have a joke at Anthony Weiner’s expense, particularly at the Carlos Danger alter-ego. “The greatest fake hotel sign-in name ever,” he said, adding that he’ll use it on the first show.
Olbermann added that he had fun on SportsCenter, unlike his other jobs. “I've done and enjoyed and own the work that I've done, but that's not what this is,” he said, notes the Times. The other shows “took a lot out of me, and were not that much fun.”
He was asked if he learned anything from his past exits from shows, which have all been messy. “Man, I better have,” he said. “I have to have figured out what parts of it were my fault.”
Olbermann will also be contributing to TBS’ coverage of the MLB playoffs in October.
image: CBS