Thanks to ESPN’s The Last Dance, the ‘90s Chicago Bulls have been at the forefront of the sports conversation in recent weeks. Tuesday morning, longtime sportscaster Andrea Kremer joined Ben & Woods on San Diego’s 97.3 The Fan and offered an interesting story about Dennis Rodman.
He’s known for his intense defensive prowess on the court, while being an excessive partier off it, but Rodman also had a softer, sentimental side.
“As a young reporter, when you walk into a locker room, especially as a female reporter, it’s always fraught with a lot of anxiety,” Kremer told The Fan’s Ben Higgins and Steven Woods. “And there’s no question that holding the ESPN mic flag and having that moniker imbues in you, a degree of ‘okay, that’s who she is and that’s who she’s with’ and I never overlooked that.”
Currently, Kremer works for NFL Network, but the Emmy Award-winning journalist spent nearly two decades with ESPN, beginning in 1989 while Rodman was a member of the Detroit Pistons. Kremer remembered a moment early on in her tenure, when Rodman checked in to make sure everybody was treating her with respect.
“‘If anybody gives you any trouble, you come to me and I’ll take care of it,'” Kremer recalled Rodman saying.
“Wow, where did that come from?” Kremer thought to herself at the time, also telling Ben & Woods that she “really, really appreciated it.”
There’s no question women sportscasters have been dealt an added set of challenges when trying to earn the respect of fans, athletes and their peers. But for Kremer, a trailblazing pioneer in the industry, Rodman treated her with respect from the start.
Brandon Contes is a former reporter for BSM, now working for Awful Announcing. You can find him on Twitter @BrandonContes or reach him by email at Brandon.Contes@gmail.com.
