SMITHFIELD – Dave Portnoy, Barstool Sports editor and publisher, has ruffled feathers at Bryant University, causing the institution’s vice presidents for academic affairs and student affairs to question invitations for speakers that express “unpopular or inappropriate” points of views.
Portnoy, known as “El Pres” at the popular sports commentary blog, was invited to speak at Bryant on Sept. 21 by the campus’s Collegiate Entrepreneurs’ Organization about being a young entrepreneur and how he built up readership.
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The controversy arose, however, from a post that was published previous to the event on Barstool Sports about the university’s football team.
On Aug. 24, Portnoy had posted a photo – sent to him by a reader – of the university’s football team “shirtless in study hall.” The photo shows the half-naked players staring at laptops. In the post, Portnoy pointed out one of players, calling him “fat.”
At the speaking engagement, the player’s girlfriend confronted him about the post.
The drama continued after The Archway, Bryant’s student newspaper, published a photo of Portnoy at the event which he reacted to online, saying the photo made his nose look bigger than it actually is and captures him in a “somewhat homoerotic pose.”
Bryant University decided to address the snowballing interaction by sending out an e-mail to the community on Oct. 6, noting the concerns over the “rough talk and responses on [the Barstool Sports] website” following the engagement.
The university said it wanted to “embrace free speech” and invite controversial speakers to campus, but asked faculty and staff to lead discussions on how to “frame” the events in an appropriate manner.
The Archway said that Portnoy’s appearance at Bryant had more than 400 people in attendance and the university’s WJMF 88.7 listeners jumped from 48 to about 300 listeners thanks to the Barstool editor.
