{"id":872553,"date":"2026-10-06T08:08:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-06T08:08:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/872553\/"},"modified":"2026-10-06T08:08:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-06T08:08:12","slug":"fired-blazers-broadcaster-asking-for-reinstatement-lawyer-says-team-stands-by-decision","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/872553\/","title":{"rendered":"Fired Blazers broadcaster asking for reinstatement, lawyer says; team stands by decision"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">PORTLAND Ore. (KPTV) &#8211; Braiden Bell, the broadcaster the Portland Trail Blazers <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kptv.com\/2026\/10\/02\/trail-blazers-fire-new-play-by-play-broadcaster-hours-after-hiring-announced\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.kptv.com\/2026\/10\/02\/trail-blazers-fire-new-play-by-play-broadcaster-hours-after-hiring-announced\/\">both hired and fired on the same day<\/a>, has hired counsel and is asking for reinstatement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Bell was announced as the team\u2019s new television play-by-play voice on Thursday. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Just hours later, the Blazers abruptly announced that they had fired Bell based on resurfaced derogatory tweets he had posted as a teenager.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cBraiden is not asking anyone to excuse what he wrote,\u201d said Arnie Herz, counsel to Bell, in a statement. \u201cHe has owned it, without excuses. What he is asking is whether a boy\u2019s words from fourteen years ago should outweigh everything the man has done since. If that is the standard, there is hardly a person in any organization in America who could meet it. Accountability means owning what you did and showing who you have become. Braiden has done both.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Through his counsel, Bell also asked that backlash against employees at KGW, who initially reported on the derogatory tweets, come to an end.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cI love this game, I love this city, and I am grateful to every fan who has reached out over the past few days,\u201d Bell said in a statement. \u201cI will keep working every day to be someone Rip City can be proud of, whatever happens next.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">However, the team does not appear to have any intention of bringing him back into the fold.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">FOX 12 obtained the following statement from the Trail Blazers regarding the announcement:<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cWe stand by our statement issued last week and have no further comment at this time. We wish Mr. Bell the best.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Bell was set to replace Kevin Calabro, who <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kptv.com\/2026\/10\/01\/portland-trail-blazers-name-new-play-by-play-broadcaster\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.kptv.com\/2026\/10\/01\/portland-trail-blazers-name-new-play-by-play-broadcaster\/\">accepted a job with the Minnesota Timberwolves<\/a> last month.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The 29-year-old previously served as a broadcaster for the WNBA\u2019s Phoenix Mercury and the NBA G League\u2019s Valley Suns.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The Blazers open their preseason schedule against the Golden State Warriors on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 KPTV-KPDX. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PORTLAND Ore. (KPTV) &#8211; Braiden Bell, the broadcaster the Portland Trail Blazers both hired and fired on the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":872554,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[5574,230,26096,28,96950,7053,61275,1976,73371,67236,52101,296,526,25274,41220,41520,17452,93669,367673,2125,25691,15510,24403,299356,1739,5871,52519,355,3258,6319,8510,50359,10723,60682,3858,99,27620,113648,14489,111656,14847,10127,6145,90039,129504,8128,6671,32432,56744],"class_list":["post-872553","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-academy","tag-architecture","tag-building","tag-business","tag-cabinet","tag-city","tag-closet","tag-college","tag-container","tag-contemporary","tag-corridor","tag-dark","tag-education","tag-empty","tag-floor","tag-garage","tag-hall","tag-hallway","tag-instruct","tag-interior","tag-light","tag-lock","tag-locker","tag-lockers","tag-metal","tag-metro","tag-modern","tag-nba","tag-new","tag-night","tag-old","tag-parking","tag-room","tag-safe","tag-school","tag-sports","tag-station","tag-subway","tag-teaching","tag-tin","tag-train","tag-transport","tag-transportation","tag-trunk","tag-tunnel","tag-underground","tag-university","tag-urban","tag-vintage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/872553","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=872553"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/872553\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/872554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=872553"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=872553"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=872553"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}