Ex-Colts punter, media mogul Pat McAfee apologizes, kind of, for Larry Nassar tweet

Former Indianapolis Colts punter-turned media sensation Pat McAfee, who recently signed a five-year, $85 million deal with ESPN, apologized Monday -- kind of -- for his controversial post on social media that linked Michigan State football's neon uniforms to the university's former sports doctor Larry Nassar.

"I think Nassar was in on the design team actually," McAfee tweeted in response to a photo of the uniforms.

Nassar is a former sports medicine physician who, for 18 years, was team doctor for the United States women's national gymnastics team. While in that job, Nassar used his position to exploit and sexually assault hundreds of children and young women. Nassar was sentenced to 175 years in prison in 2018 for sexual abuse under the guise of medical treatment.

McAfee's tweet referencing Nassar on X (formerly Twitter) on Sunday, immediately drew backlash with people calling for him to delete the comment. McAfee posted a GIF in response that said, "For What? For What?"

But on Monday, McAfee issued an apology in a video, which he tweeted with the words: "It got loud on the internet yesterday. Larry Nassar is a terrible human being, and this show has covered that pretty extensively."

In the video, McAfee went on to say, "There is an all-out onslaught against me right now for simply linking one terrible thing from a school to the most terrible thing from the school to a friend in a reply tweet, talking (expletive) to a friend.

"I do apologize if some people took that in a different way and then spun it in their own narrative to offend a bunch of other people and then kind of did that whole thing."

The backlash continued after McAfee's apology with some saying he didn't seem sincere. Other responses backed McAfee, including one from @Go_Blue1985 which said, "MSU fan base is the softest in the world. Now you know."

"Thinking a joke isn't funny that mentions a guy that sexually assaulted hundreds of women when discussing a football uniform doesn't make someone 'soft.' Sorry," tweeted Andrew Cumbow, who writes for SpartanHoops.com.

"Does it feel like some Michigan State alums are trying to silence the media, whenever they acknowledge Larry Nassar, one of the most horrible humans, ever, of all time, he was at Michigan State for 14 years," McAfee said. "So that's not really a part of the story. They kind of created and empowered, and yeah, so like, if that's going to get us canceled..."

McAfee said he had no idea the tweet would offend anyone. He was simply responding to a Michigan State alum, reminding him the awful things Nassar did, which people need to be reminded of now and forever, he said.

"We need to tell people that there's disgusting, horrible people in powerful positions," McAfee said in the video. "This isn't something where it's like, 'I can't talk about this.' No, like, hey, in our history, very recent history, people were given a lot of power that were very terrible people in the sports world and the way we decide to cover it is by talking (expletive) to somebody who loves everything about Michigan State because it's his school."

After he sent the tweet, McAfee said he put his phone down and went to the state fair with his wife. He didn't think anything of it until X started blowing up.

"Then I got everybody telling me I need to delete it and all that (expletive)," McAfee said. "I'm like, well, if I delete and apologize for that, um, I think there's about 150 shows we're going to have to delete. I will talk (expletive) about bad people forever. Sue me. Don't actually."

Follow IndyStar sports reporter Dana Benbow on Twitter: @DanaBenbow. Reach her via email: dbenbow@indystar.com.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Pat McAfee, ex-Colts punter, ESPN host, apologizes for Larry Nassar tweet