Fox Sports opted towards airing “Jeopardy” champion Amy Schneider throwing out a first pitch in the course of the community’s protection of a baseball sport from San Francisco this weekend, as an alternative exhibiting footage of NASCAR driver Kurt Busch making a ceremonial toss.
Schneider, an Oakland resident who triumphed in 40 consecutive “Jeopardy” contests and is the show’s greatest female player, took the mound forward of the Giants-Los Angeles Dodgers sport on Saturday.
The unexplained snub took on even better weight since Schneider, the first transgender lady to qualify for “Jeopardy’s” Tournament of Champions, had appeared Saturday as a part of Pride Day at Oracle Park.
Schneider’s toss wasn’t aired by Fox Sports, which carried the sport regionally. Instead, the community confirmed Busch throwing out a first pitch — which he did at Oracle Park on Thursday earlier than the Giants performed the Colorado Rockies.
Fox announcers used Busch’s ceremonial toss to remind viewers the community was televising Sunday’s NASCAR race at Sonoma Raceway, simply 40 miles north of Oracle Park.
But placement of the Busch footage, with out mentioning that it had occurred 48 hours earlier, gave viewers the impression that he made the throw on Saturday and never Schneider.
“I wanted to make a correction from what I watched yesterday on the Fox broadcast,” Giants broadcaster Duane Kuiper told fans on NBC Sports Bay Area on Sunday. “The broadcast implied that Kurt Busch threw out the first pitch yesterday which was not true.”
“It was Amy Schneider from ‘Jeopardy’ fame who threw out the first pitch on Pride Day yesterday,” Kuiper added. “So I just wanted to make sure she got her due.”
The Dodgers and Giants put apart their historical rivalry and each donned caps with rainbow colors as an alternative of L.A.’s distinctive white and San Francisco’s orange.
Representatives for Fox Sports on Monday didn’t instantly return a number of messages from NBC News looking for a response.
Cyd Zeigler, co-founder of Outsports.com, mentioned he was keen to chop Fox slack for the oversight.
“They showed the (scoreboard and other stadium signage) showing ‘Pride Day’ multiple times when they didn’t have to,” Zeigler mentioned Monday.
Zeigler sympathized with viewers upset by the snub, however mentioned he doesn’t consider there was any sick intent.
“Is this some moment of transphobia? No, that’s not how I read it,” Zeigler mentioned. “It’s certainly unfortunate that it happened and it’s great the announcers the next day talked about it. But I’m not reading this as trying to erase the LGBT community. It’s embarrassing, it’s just stupid.”
Schneider declined touch upon the Fox snub on Monday and mentioned she was grateful for the prospect to take the Oracle Park mound.
“As a lifelong baseball fan, just getting the chance to walk out on the field, let alone throw out the first pitch, was a dream come true,” she mentioned in an announcement launched by “Jeopardy.”
“I also want to state for the record that in my practice session I was getting it over the plate about half the time, so that pitch did not represent the best that I can do!”
Busch finished 18th on Sunday on the Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Sonoma Raceway. His brother, Kyle Busch, won Saturday night’s Camping World Truck Series race in Sonoma.