Druski addressed his viral moment from the NFL Honors award show in San Francisco, where he mispronounced the name of Offensive Player of the Year award winner Jaxon Smith-Njigba… with the comedian revealing he reached out to the NFL star, but never heard back.
The comedian appeared on CBS Mornings, where Nate Burleson asked him about his pronunciation of Smith-Njigba’s name — which sparked significant backlash online.
.@druski pushes the limits in his comedy — but he says that all his work “comes from a good place, a good-hearted situation.”
The comedian discusses season 2 of his dating series, “Coulda Been Love,” and taking chances. pic.twitter.com/KTqmucnmrH
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“I like to mess around,” he said. “Sometimes you can go too far.”
While he added that it’s a difficult name to pronounce, the 31-year-old mentioned he attempted to contact the Seahawks wide receiver about it.
“Congratulations to him, the team on the Super Bowl,” Druski said. “I think that was an amazing thing. I didn’t get any response back, but I did reach out, I tried.”
The Super Bowl-winning wide receiver has yet to address Druski publicly, either, but we do know people close to the standout wide receiver were upset, including teammate Uchenna Nwosu, who called Druski “lame” after the incident.
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NFL
The Seahawks PR team even called him out, saying, “Hall of Famer Barry Sanders drew the short straw getting stuck with Druski’s big whiff tonight.”
“Put some respect on. Put some respect on @Seahawks WR @jaxson_smith1’s name.”
Druski wasn’t the only comedian to struggle with names during the NFL’s award show … Tiffany Haddish frustrated fans with her pronunciation of Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel‘s name, although it was a bit less controversial than her comedian counterpart.
