By Debbie Schlussel

In 2000, ESPN began its silly quest to force the mostly male TV college football fans to endure a female play-by-play announcer. Pam Ward was plopped onto the air to call college football. And it was a disaster, as it has been ever since. Women do not know football like men do. And men don’t want to hear them calling games. Somebody has to say it. And, clearly, plenty of people did because ESPN finally pulled Pam Ward off of the college football play-by-play, after slowly dropping her farther and farther to the bottom of its roster of college football on-air personalities. She just doesn’t know how to call a game, and her masculine/butch attire and matching haircut didn’t help.

ESPN still has one woman remaining on some of its college football broadcasts, Beth Mowins. But, hopefully, the network will get rid of her, too.

Men want to hear women call a game as much as they want to know the details of used tampons and as much as male broadcasters want to cover women’s basketball. Maybe even less. (Women college football fans don’t like women color commentators and play-by-play announcers, either.) But they have no choice in the matter because if ESPN is broadcasting a college football game, you can’t see it anywhere else, so where are you gonna go? But, by some miracle, ESPN finally woke up to its equivalent of fingernails scratching on a chalk board. I hope this marks the beginning of the end of ESPN’s experiments in political correctness, but that would be wisful thinking. Still, removing Pam Ward is a start.

Buh-bye, Pam. Don’t let the jock-strap hit ya on the way out.