Overview
- The Trail Blazers announced Braiden Bell as their new television play-by-play announcer on Thursday and fired him the same day after a local reporter uncovered racist and misogynistic posts from 2012–2013.
- KGW reporter Devon Haskins located the decade-old tweets, notified the team, and the Blazers later said the posts breached their standards and that they would not move forward with Bell.
- Bell, 29, apologized on X saying the tweets were written when he was about 15 and do not reflect who he is today, and he made his account private after the posts resurfaced.
- The abrupt reversal leaves Portland without a permanent lead TV voice with preseason days away and the Oct. 21 season opener approaching, forcing the team to restart its broadcaster search quickly.
- The team acknowledged a failure in its vetting process and issued an apology to fans, a misstep that draws scrutiny to recent personnel changes following Kevin Calabro’s departure and ownership-led cost cuts.