WTSP-CBS in Tampa said yesterday that it has taken a
commercial promoting a local radio station featuring Bucs DL
Warren Sapp "off its airwaves because it offended viewers"
by being "too sexually suggestive," according to Ernest
Hooper of the ST. PETERSBURG TIMES. Additionally, the ad
"won't be aired before" 11:00pm ET on WTTA-WB. The ad shows
Sapp and a radio disc jockey "standing at a urinal, engaging
in a series of vague but suggestive comments about size,"
but at the end of the spot, Sapp "reveals [that] the topic
of conversation" is a diamond-studded wristwatch. WTSP
Marketing Dir Pete Nikiel, on the ad: "The spot clearly
should not be airing on our station, and I don't know if
anyone should air it." But the spot "continues to appear on
other local" stations, as well as in local ads during
national cable broadcasts on networks such as ESPN and MTV.
Sapp declined comment on the spot, but Mike Oliviero,
Promotion Dir of WXTB, the radio station that paid for the
ad, "defended it as an attempt at humor." Calling it a
"play on words," Oliviero said, "It's a joke ... and people
should take it for what it is" (ST. PETE TIMES, 4/25).
