YES Network’s Paul O’Neill was supposed to promote his new book, “Swing and a Hit,” Monday on WFAN, but instead he never stepped to the plate.
Tiki & Tierney, WFAN’s mid-morning show, canceled O’Neill’s appearance on Tuesday after being told that the former Yankees outfielder would not talk about the Josh Donaldson-Tim Anderson incident in which Donaldson referred to Anderson as “Jackie.”
The program had spent most of the first hour-and-a-half on the topic, preceding O’Neill’s appearance, but was told O’Neill would not answer questions about the subject.
Brandon Tierney made the decision, which he revealed on-air when O’Neill was supposed to be on.
O’Neill was waiting on a Zoom to be on, as Barber was finishing up a point.
“We were supposed to have him on right now and he is on hold, OK,” said Tierney, who listed O’Neill as his second favorite all-time Yankee after Don Mattingly.
“He has a new book coming out, called, ‘Swing and a Hit.’ And Jack Curry wrote it, along with Paul. We were told and Tiki, you don’t even know this because I was going through this while you were finishing up your thought on the air. We were told we can not ask anything about Donaldson and Anderson.
“I said, ‘We can’t do the interview if that is the case.’ I said, ‘Please tell Paul, we will navigate this responsibly. We will not belabor it. But I can’t have Paul O’Neill on the show after we spent an hour and 35 minutes talking about Tim Anderson and Josh Donaldson and not ask him about what transpired. That sucks. No disrespect to Paul. I love him. Truly, my second all-time favorite Yankee. We have a responsibility to the show.”
A message from The Post to O’Neill and to the media relations contact for Grand Central Publishing were not immediately returned.
O’Neill had been in the news this year. He has been calling games from his Ohio home, while his fellow YES game announcers, like Michael Kay, David Cone, Carlos Beltran and Cameron Maybin, have been working from the booth at stadiums. YES’ policy is that personnel on site need to be vaccinated for COVID-19.