If you have never heard of Michael Rapaport’s media style, then you might be shocked at this headline. But if you are (were) a follower of his, this is the expected outcome of his “career” in sports sleaze. The idea of Barstool Sports from Rapaport’s eyes apparently was that it would be a verbal free-for-all about sports figures, be it media or the athletes themselves. There were obviously enough fans to keep him afloat for a while, “a while” meaning from the start of his tenure in June of 2017 at Barstool Sports. But the personality was going to doom any podcast possibilities, sooner than later as it turned out.
From what can be gathered, it seems Rapaport had a “me versus the world” mentality when it came to his relationship with just about anyone else. That may be good for a while, but over time it was revealed that this was more than an attitude — it was how he actually viewed his real world collaboration with everyone at Barstool Sports. The online wear included bloggers such as Kevin Clancy, who Rapaport called out for being caught with his pants and other things down in a public shaming moment. Since this is the Internet, Clancy fired a shot across Rapaport’s personal bow that Rapaport is on the legal blotter for having a restraining order placed against him.
But Clancy is outside of the program’s staff. Rapaport didn’t play favorites (at least he’s even handed) and is reported to have told the editor-in-chief of Barstool Sports, Keith Markovich, that he was not “relevant.” If Rapaport was such an important sports and media figure, why was he continually asking Markovich to promote his podcast? Markovich has screenshots of those requests and posted them, showing Rapaport how “relevant” he is.
The end would come after a tweet from one Blake Baker in a reply to SmittyBarstool: “Can you start a pole asking stoolies if they like @MichaelRapaport. I think that may shut him up.”
To which Rapaport replied, “if you call yourself a f***ing stoolie for real, you’ve already lost in life”
Dave Portnoy, who really is relevant in Barstool Sports since he is the founder of the program, fired Rapaport in an NSFW video, where he made it clear that Rapaport was done. The expletive filled public firing by Portnoy told Rapaport that his public feuding on Twitter that resulted in Rapaport calling a Stoolie a loser either had the potential or actually did damage the brand of Barstool Sports. It didn’t help that Portnoy had to take a private jet to get home and deal with the problem, as he sent the tweet lying in his bed, obviously none to too happy that he had to deal with this problem at all.
Publicly demonstrating to Rapaport the egregious nature of his inability to keep his mouth shut (or his fingers away from the keypad) he said he never had to fire someone from his bed, on a Sunday morning, before he even got up. Ever. It really is amazing that someone in the 21st century who is trying to make a living online doing podcasts actually believes he can insult his (in this case, Barstool Sports) fan base and its 90 employees without severe repercussions.
If you were wondering whether this was just a media stunt to create a buzz, Portnoy’s video sends a very different message. There are some people that just can’t help themselves.
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