ESPN: We’re sorry we asked you if you’d like to see Kevin Garnett blow out his knee

December 11th, 2007 | Posted by PostmanR

By now, even the novice sporting fan is privy to the New England takeover that is current among us. The Patriots are pwning n00bs every week; the Red Sox just won a World Series; the Celtics are the darlings of this young NBA season. So with that in mind, ESPN decided to do one of their infamous poll questions, a “What would you rather see?” type deal.

I’ll let the Boston Herald elaborate.

The question, based on the success of Boston’s professional sports teams, asked whether voters would rather see the Patriots lose to the Steelers, Johan Santana be traded to a team other than the Red Sox or Kevin Garnett blow out his knee.

The poll was switched by Friday night, but when Garnett learned of it, he told the Herald, “Wow, that’s really distasteful, man.”

Nor was Celtics coach Doc Rivers pleased to hear about the feature, which appeared on ESPN.com’s Page 2. Celtics PR man Jeff Twiss expressed the team’s unhappiness with the item and said yesterday afternoon that ESPN was “apologetic.”

Later in the day, ESPN released the following statement:

“Friday’s ESPN.com Page 2 poll used very poor judgment in its option about Kevin Garnett. The poll was removed immediately upon the senior editorial staff becoming aware, and we sincerely regret the error in judgment. We are addressing the issue and apologize to Kevin Garnett, to the Celtics organization and to those offended by the poll question. Obviously, we wish good health to all athletes.”

Rumor has it the first version of this poll also had a choice on whether or not you’d like to see the entire Patriots team go down in a fiery plane crash, but ESPN pulled it at the last minute because Tom Brady is just too handsome to leave God’s Green Earth this early.

{HT: Ballhype/Celtics Blog}