Shannon Sharpe is leaving his Undisputed show on Fox Sports 1 after five years.
The New York Post has claimed that Sharpe has agreed a deal with Fox over a buyout over his terms and his last show will be in June after the NBA Finals.
It comes months after Sharpe and co-host Skip Bayless publicly disagreed with how the NFL should handle Damar Hamlin’s cardiac arrest back in January.
The Post also reported on Wednesday night that Sharpe wanted parity with Bayless in terms of influence over what topics are discussed on the show.
Bayless tweeted the night of Hamlin’s collapse in early January that the NFL couldn’t postpone the Buffalo Bills game with Bengals due to scheduling, despite genuine fears about Hamlin surviving after going into cardiac arrest on the field.
Shannon Sharpe is reportedly leaving Undisputed, with his departure set for June
Sharpe has clashed with co-host Skip Bayless in recent months – notably over Damar Hamlin
Sharpe has reportedly agreed terms with Fox over a buyout of his terms in order to depart
‘No doubt the NFL is considering postponing the rest of this game – but how? This late in the season, a game of this magnitude is crucial to the regular-season outcome … which suddenly seems so irrelevant,’ Bayless wrote.
Sharpe stayed away from the following day’s episode of Undisputed and when he returned a day later, was visibly frustrated by Bayless interrupting him while he explained his stance.
Bayless apologized for the tweet but did not delete it.
‘Skip tweeted something, and although I disagreed with the tweet, and hopefully Skip will take it down,’ Sharpe said, explaining his absence around the Hamlin incident, before Bayless interjected.
‘Timeout,’ Bayless said Wednesday. ‘I’m not going to take it down, because I stand by what I tweeted.’
Sharpe responded: ‘I can’t even get through a monologue without you interrupting me.
‘I was just gonna say, Skip, I didn’t want, yesterday, to get into a situation where Damar Hamlin was the issue. We should be talking about him, and not get into your tweet.
That’s what I was gonna do. But you can’t even let me finish my opening monologue without you interrupting.’
Sharpe has spoken fondly of Bayless in the past but appears to want to go in a new direction
Sharpe spoke on Chris ‘Mad Dog’ Russo’s podcast about his Hamlin disagreement with Bayless
The above tweet from Bayless on the night Hamlin had his cardiac arrest caused outrage
The following month, Sharpe opened up on how he repaired his relationship with Bayless.
‘We see things differently, that’s why we work on the show,’ Sharpe said in February on Chris ‘Mad Dog’ Russo’s podcast. ‘I don’t want disagreements to go outside of the lines and I think it did. I think everybody thought it.
‘More people know me from Undisputed than from the NFL – most people don’t realize I actually played and was a pretty good player!’
The premise of Undisputed is that 54-year-old Sharpe, a three-time Super Bowl champion, and Bayless debate the day’s major sports talking points – whether they are in agreement or not.
They also clashed on a personal level back in December when Bayless compared Sharpe retiring at 35 to Tom Brady playing up to 45.
Sharpe played as a tight end – winning two Super Bowls with Denver Broncos and one other with the Baltimore Ravens.
‘I did what I did!’ Sharpe responded. ‘You make it seem like I was a bum! I’m in the effin’ Hall of Fame. I got three Super Bowls!’
Bayless did not back down, he said: ‘So what? He’s way better than you were.’
Sharpe was a three-time Super Bowl winner during his NFL playing career as a tight end
It only angered Sharpe further and as he tried to speak Bayless interrupted, leading to the former tight end screaming ‘Time out!’ and throwing his glasses down onto the table.
Sharpe then said: ‘You’re willing to take a personal shot at me, to say he’s better than me, because I say he’s playing bad this year?’
Sharpe’s podcast, Club Shay Shay, is also believed to be following him out of Fox.
Bayless, meanwhile, had not offered any comment on reports on his official Twitter account, where he posts regularly.
Undisputed is scheduled to continue at 9:30am ET on Thursday.
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