Potential GOP Candidate: Hillary's a "Fat B----"

An article in today's Boston Herald and yesterday's Lowell Sun (via Dick Howe) give us the news that "prominent Republicans" are trying to get former NFL player and current WEEI sports radio talk show co-host Fred Smerlas to run for the seat Marty Meehan (D-Lowell) is vacating in the Fifth District. Smerlas is quoted in the Herald as giving it "serious thought" and in the Sun, Republican analyst Holly Robichaud describes him as an "excellent candidate." Smerlas has most recently made the news for running afoul of the New England Patriot's scalping policy, and lost forty of his season tickets. Smerlas is also the owner of a telemarketing firm in Newton.

At one time I was a frequent listener to WEEI, and I'm all too familiar with the Big Show with Glenn Ordway, which Smerlas often co-hosts along with a cast of other Boston sports radio characters. The show frequently strays from sports and devolves into locker room talk. It can be funny, but the humor is often mean-spirited. Unfortunately perhaps for Smerlas, some of his attempts at humor have made their way to the papers. Here's one from a Boston Globe Magazine story about WEEI:

WEEI's The Big Show somehow gets around to Hillary Rodham Clinton. Fred Smerlas, a former NFL lineman and regular guest, has an opinion on the junior senator from New York that he'd like to share.

"That fat b-- ," he explains, and everybody laughs.

Last year, Smerlas was quoted by the NY Post calling former Patriots and current USC coach Pete Carroll a "fairy". From that article:

Smerlas, who works for Boston all-sports station WEEI, said in an interview with WFAN's Chris Russo that Carroll looked "light in the heels" and "fairy." Russo didn’t challenge Smerlas on the use of the slang.

"He caught me by surprise by saying it," Russo said via phone. "I came back and I talked about [Carroll's] presence. It was a poor of choice of words [by Smerlas]."

Those are just two examples that I found with ten minutes of Googling. I am sure there are countless other examples of outrageous or inappropriate remarks by Smerlas that would be unearthed with a little more digging.

In January, sports columnist John Molori had this to say about Smerlas as a broadcaster:

[W]hen Smerlas journeys outside football, it is a sad trip. Smerlas is at his best interviewing Bill Belichick. Outside of that, he is a verbal accident waiting to happen.

An accident waiting to happen. That's the guy the Mass. GOP is recruiting to be their standard bearer in the Fifth District.