{"id":473350,"date":"2026-02-17T06:51:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T06:51:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/473350\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T06:51:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T06:51:10","slug":"ex-espner-kenny-mayne-reveals-augusta-national-ban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/473350\/","title":{"rendered":"Ex-ESPNer Kenny Mayne reveals Augusta National ban"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Kenny Mayne isn\u2019t welcome at the Masters.<\/p>\n<p>The former ESPN anchor revealed during an appearance on a recent episode of \u201cGod Bless Football\u201d with Jon \u201cStugotz\u201d Weiner that he believes he\u2019s been banned from Augusta National for good. <\/p>\n<p>Mayne didn\u2019t say when his ban began, but he has a good idea what caused it.<\/p>\n<p>The Masters is extremely protective of the image of the course and the tournament, including the verbiage used during broadcasts, such as fans being called \u201cpatrons\u201d instead.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"38512894\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2179548419.jpg\" alt=\"Former ESPN star Kenny Mayne said he is banned from Augusta National. \" class=\"wp-image-38512894\"  \/>Former ESPN star Kenny Mayne said he is banned from Augusta National.  Icon Sportswire via Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>Mayne, 66, believes he broke that code while part of ESPN\u2019s golf coverage and is paying for it after Stugotz asked the former \u201cSportsCenter\u201d star if he has played the legendary course.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m banned for life from Augusta, I think,\u201d Mayne said. \u201cI used to cover golf, I used to do the TPC Sawgrass, and I did the U.S. Open every year for, I don\u2019t know, seven or eight years. It was me, Van Pelt, Andy North, the whole gang.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAt TPC one year, I just made some smartass comment about, \u2018We\u2019ll see you at the Masters, where we bring four saucy ladies out to play!\u2019 Or, you know, just something stupid, right? But mentioning that I\u2019m bringing women to play golf. And [Augusta National] called into the ESPN truck, like we\u2019re still on the air, and the people in Augusta are literally, they somehow have the inside number to the truck. And they were like, \u2018He is not coming!\u2019 So I was never invited to go by my lords.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Augusta did not admit its first female member until 2012, with former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and financier Darla More breaking an 80-year-old tradition.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"38513071\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/tiger-woods-united-states-plays-15895877.jpg\" alt=\"Tiger Woods swinging a golf club on the 14th tee during a practice round at Augusta National Golf Club, surrounded by spectators.\" class=\"wp-image-38513071\"  \/>Tiger Woods of the United States plays his shot from the 14th tee during a practice round prior to the Masters at Augusta National Golf Club on April 06, 2022. Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>ESPN has been a longstanding partner with the Masters, splitting the broadcast of the event with CBS since 2008, with ESPN getting the opening two rounds for one of golf\u2019s four major championships.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Mayne left ESPN in May 2021 after a 27-year career on the network, declining to take a significant pay cut.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kenny Mayne isn\u2019t welcome at the Masters. The former ESPN anchor revealed during an appearance on a recent&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":473351,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[134878,352,427,99,1625,3015,51195],"class_list":{"0":"post-473350","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-augusta-national","9":"tag-espn","10":"tag-golf","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-sports-entertainment","13":"tag-sports-media","14":"tag-the-masters"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/473350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=473350"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/473350\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/473351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=473350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=473350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=473350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}