ESPN Getting Crushed For Showing Damar Hamlin After 'Death' Comment At ESPYs

The 2024 ESPY Awards honored former New Orleans Saints star Steve Gleason with the Arthur Ashe Courage Award for his long battle with ALS and contributions to ALS awareness. But a broadcast decision by ESPN during his acceptance speech has a lot of people upset.

As Gleason delivered his speech and said “I should have been dead years ago,” the cameras panned to Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin, who collapsed and nearly died on the field during an NFL game a year-and-a-half ago.

Fans didn’t like how the cameras seemingly tried to take advantage of Hamlin’s near-death experience to try and get some extra points:

“The producer already had the shot of Damar in queue, before pressing the Violence button. This is beyond being a nasty girl,” one user declared.

“Nah they down bad for that,” wrote another.

“Wow, SMH. Nefarious work,” a third wrote.

“I should have been dead years ago” camera pans to Damar Hamlin.. ??? pic.twitter.com/XWOTSdU342

— Gifdsports (@gifdsports) July 12, 2024

In the aftermath of Hamlin’s on-field heart attack, many people started spreading weird conspiracy theories that Hamlin actually did die and that the person representing him now is either a clone or a paid actor. That’s pretty well-reflected in the comments of the video above.

It’s understandable then that people don’t like Hamlin’s trauma being used for emotional brownie points.