Fox Sports opted not to air “Jeopardy” champ Amy Schneider, who made a first pitch during the network’s coverage of a San Francisco baseball game this weekend, and instead showed footage of NASCAR driver Kurt Busch doing a ceremonial throw made.
Schneider, an Oakland resident who has triumphed in 40 straight Jeopardy contests and is the show’s top player, conquered the mound ahead of Saturday’s Giants-Los Angeles Dodgers game.
The unexplained snub gained even more weight since Schneider, the first transgender woman to qualify for the “Jeopardy” Tournament of Champions, performed at Oracle Park as part of Pride Day on Saturday.
Schneider’s throw was not broadcast by Fox Sports, which broadcast the game regionally. Instead, the network showed Busch throwing a first pitch — which he did Thursday at Oracle Park before the Giants played the Colorado Rockies.
Fox announcers used Busch’s ceremonial toss to remind viewers that the network was televising Sunday’s NASCAR race at Sonoma Raceway, just 40 miles north of Oracle Park.
But the placement of the Busch footage without mentioning that it had happened 48 hours earlier left viewers with the impression that he made the pitch on Saturday and not Schneider.
“I wanted to make a correction to what I saw on Fox’s show yesterday,” Giants broadcaster Duane Kuiper told fans Sunday on NBC Sports Bay Area. “The show implied that Kurt Busch threw out the first pitch yesterday, which was not true.”
“It was Amy Schneider from ‘Jeopardy’ who threw out the first pitch yesterday on Pride Day,” added Kuiper. “So I just wanted to make sure she got her rights.”
The Dodgers and Giants put aside their age-old rivalry and both donned rainbow-colored caps instead of LA’s signature white and San Francisco’s orange.
Fox Sports officials did not immediately return several messages from NBC News Monday for a response.
Outsports.com co-founder Cyd Zeigler said he was willing to relax Fox for the oversight.
“They showed the (scoreboard and other stadium signage) with the ‘Pride Day’ multiple times when they didn’t have to,” Zeigler said Monday.
Zeigler sympathized with viewers, who were upset by the snub, but said he didn’t think there was any malicious intent.
“Is that a moment of transphobia? No, I don’t read it that way,” said Zeigler. “It’s certainly unfortunate that it happened and it’s great that the announcers spoke about it the next day. But I don’t see that as an attempt to wipe out the LGBT community. It’s embarrassing, it’s just stupid.”
Schneider declined comment on the Fox brusque Monday and said she was grateful for the chance to take the Oracle Park hill.
“As a lifelong baseball fan, the chance to walk on the field let alone throw the first pitch was a dream come true,” she said in a statement released by Jeopardy.
“I would also like to point out that I got over the plate about half the time in my practice session, so this pitch wasn’t the best thing I could do!”
Busch finished 18th in Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Sonoma Raceway. His brother Kyle Busch won the Camping World Truck Series race in Sonoma on Saturday night.
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