Podcaster Josh Neighbors: I was fired for airing Bob Huggins’ ‘Catholic f–s’ comments uncensored

A podcaster covering the Big 12 is paying the price for his handling of West Virginia coach Bob Huggins’ use of an anti-gay slur on a Cincinnati radio show.

Huggins referred to Xavier fans as “Catholic f–s” during an interview with Bill Cunningham on WLW in Cincinnati on Monday.

Josh Neighbors, the host of the “Locked On Big 12” podcast, said he chose to air Huggins’ comments uncensored during an instant reaction version of his show and announced Wednesday night on Twitter that the decision cost him his job.

“I made the conscious decision to play Bob Huggins’ comments in their entirety and without censoring the slurs that he used,” Neighbors said in the video. “I did that because I thought it was important to play and get the full context of what he had said. I followed that up by saying I thought what he said was abhorrent. I thought it was hateful and also that if I was the AD I would have fired him and I would not want somebody like that espousing those views coaching my team.”

Neighbors has been with the network founded by Utah Jazz radio voice David Locke since January 2020 and produced more than 600 episodes for it — but said the company chose not to budge on it “zero-tolerance policy” for hate speech.

Though Neighbors said he may disagree with the decision, he understands the company’s right to make it.

“The folks at Locked On felt differently,” he said. “They felt because I willingly was posting hate speech, which I did. … I was obviously not using the hate speech, I was trying to combat it and say it’s terrible and awful and should not happen. To play it and give the full context to give the folks a chance to hear it all, I did make the choice to play that.”

Neighbors, who also hosts the company’s Nationals show, said he did get to talk to Locke briefly on Wednesday — but not other decision-makers — to try to make his case, but according to him, the decision to remove him as the host already had been made.

He went on to thank the network for the opportunity it had given him and said he hoped to continue to cover the Big 12 in some capacity in the future.

“It was a very difficult conversation,” Neighbors said. “I understand they have their rules. I might disagree with them, but there is a zero-tolerance policy on hate speech whether you are decrying it or using it. That is their prerogative.”

Huggins on the other hand was allowed to keep his job as the Mountaineers basketball coach, but did face other consequences.

The 69-year-old Hall of Famer’s salary was slashed from $4.2 million to $3.2 million, and he will be suspended for the first three games of the season and attend sensitivity training.

The school also announced that “any incidents of similar derogatory and offensive language will result in immediate termination,” and Huggins’ contract is now a year-to-year agreement.