While most male sports enthusiasts still find it uninteresting to watch or listen to female sports commentators, there is no doubt that female voices like Jemele Hill have connected a considerable number of sports enthusiasts to their sports channels. Jemele Hill currently works for a Disney subsidiary, ESPN, and is undoubtedly on the list of top sports journalists, which includes Erin Jill Andrews, a former co-host of College GameDay on ESPN, and Hannah Storm. Learn more about the journalist’s career, husband, and family.
Jemele Hill Biography
Jemele Juanita Hill was born in December 1975 as Jemele Juanita Hill. Jemele Hill is a well-known sports presenter and reporter working for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network (ESPN). She was born and raised in Detroit and graduated from Michigan State University. Raised by her single mother, Jemele is of African-American descent but grew up as a wild child. In school, she got good grades and participated well in school sports such as baseball, but during high school at Samuel C. Mumford High School near the northwest side of Detroit, she became more interested in writing about sports.
Jemele’s career as a sportswriter began with Raleigh News & Observer, where she was a general sports writer. After working with them for about 18 months, she joined the Detroit Free Press and then moved to Orlando Sentinel, where she worked as a columnist before finally settling on the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network (ESPN) as its national columnist. Her role model was Gary Smith, a leading American sports journalist best known for his long human interest stories in Sports Illustrated.
Since Jemele joined ESPN in November 2006, she has had several appearances on most ESPN programs including SportsCenter, Outside the Lines, ESPN First Take, and The Sports Reporter. She has even co-hosted the station’s popular television show, His & Hers, and starting in 2018, she will work as a journalist for ESPN’s The Undefeated website.
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Why was She Suspended by ESPN?
Jemele Hill is not only known for her serenity and good behavior, but also for her openness. Although this goes against her profession as a journalist, Jemele Hill is one of those people who would always speak her mind and condemn the consequences. Jemele Hill was suspended for several of her controversial comments. For example, she was suspended from ESPN in October 2017 after she reportedly objected to the company’s social media policies by responding to Dallas Cowboys’ owner Jerry Jones and allegedly calling for a boycott of the NFL.
Jerry Jones, who is a leading American businessman and owner of the National Football League’s Dallas Cowboys, said during one of his games that he would bench any player who “does not respect the flag,” and in a response to his comment, Hills wrote, “Change happens when advertisers are affected. If JJ’s statement is very important to you, boycott his advertisers”.
This is not the first time that Jemele Hill has got herself and her employer into trouble because of her statements. On September 12, 2017, she was severely attacked by the American government because of her Tweets on SportsCenter, in which she called President Donald Trump a “White Supremacist”. In her tweet, which was published shortly after she re-twittered an article about the musician Kid Rock, Jemele said: “Donald Trump is a white racist who has largely surrounded himself with other white racists”. She went on to describe him as unfit for any leadership position and spoke more of a presidential seat.
In 2008, Jemele Hill received her first suspension after she had compared the Boston Celtics’ choice of Pistons to the Boston Celtics during the 2008 NBA playoffs to “claiming that Hitler was a victim”.
She said cheering for the Celtics was tantamount to saying Hitler was a victim. She added that it was like hoping Gorbachev would reach the flashing red button in front of Reagan. She concluded with the words: “Whether I deserve it or not, I still hate the Celts”. Although she later apologized for the comment, she was suspended by ESPN for a week.
Jemele Hill’s Husband or Boyfriend
Jemele is not yet married and tries to keep her private life private. However, there are rumors that she’s going out with several men. According to some sources, the beautiful Jamele with a good height of 5 feet 8 inches dated Ray Lewis, who was her employee. She is also seen hanging out with Idris Elba, an English actor, and musician.
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Recently she posted a picture of herself and another man on her Instagram page, and although she has chosen to hide his identity from the public, sources say he is known on social media as “old boy”.
