Former Barstool Sports contributor Ben Mintz harbors no ill-will toward leadership over his recent firing from the Penn Entertainment-owned company.
Mintz, known by his nickname “Mintzy,” was terminated on May 3 after he read a racial slur in song lyrics on a Barstool live stream.
Barstool founder Dave Portnoy made it very clear in the immediate aftermath of Mintzy’s firing that the decision was entirely on Penn, and that he, Pardon My Take host Dan “Big Cat” Katz, and Barstool CEO Erika Ayers fought to keep Mintz’s job.
Mintz, in an update video posted on his Twitter on Saturday, attested to that.
“Dave, Dan and Erika fought for me tooth and nail,” Mintz said. “Erika was so upset when she FaceTimed me letting me know I getting let go she was almost in tears. It is not any of their faults. I made a very stupid but honest mistake, I paid an enormous consequence for it, but none of this has anything to do with Big Cat, Dave or Erika not fighting as hard as they humanly could for me.”
Portnoy and Big Cat received plenty of backlash from stoolies online claiming they “sold out” in relinquishing a certain level of administrative control since Penn acquired full ownership of Barstool earlier this year. Portnoy said that once the deal went through, people knew that if they crossed certain lines there would be nothing he could do to save them.
Mintz said he leaves Barstool with some great relationships and nothing but good things to say about them, and acknowledged that Penn was the reason he even got hired at Barstool in the first place.
