The wife of a former Boston Red Sox infielder has admitted to making a burner Twitter account to defend her husband during his MLB playing days. Here’s the twist — she’s also an ESPN reporter.
ESPN’s NFL reporter Laura Rutledge, wife of Josh Rutledge (Red Sox player from 2015-2017), appeared on the “Marchand Sports Media” podcast this week and hilariously admitted to making a burner to spit fire at her husband’s critics.
“When he was with the Angels, I made a fake Twitter — I’m admitting this, OK?” Rutledge said.
“I know this was wrong. I’m not doing it ever since. But this was a one-time thing, and the name was BillyHalo76 or something. And BillyHalo only tweeted positive things about Josh Rutledge, and then the occasional Mike Trout tweet, because I was like, ‘shoot, someone’s gonna figure this out.’ So if anyone had said something negative about him, I would find them and then BillyHalo would be like, ‘you’re wrong,’ and back it up with stats. I don’t think Josh knows this. If he watches this, he’s gonna be really mad at me.”
“I really struggled with it,” Rutledge continued, referring to her husband’s haters. “There were times when he played for the Red Sox … they had him at third base, and he hadn’t played third base since middle school. He barely played third base. And he’s at the hot corner and they’re in Fenway, he has a couple of errors in a game and people are booing him and I’m like, ‘shut up!’”
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Josh Rutledge had a six-year MLB career that began with the Colorado Rockies. He was dealt to Boston by the Angels in the Shane Victorino trade that some Red Sox fans will remember. Rutledge retired in 2018 while a member of the San Francisco Giants organization.
Laura Rutledge, meanwhile, is far from retired. She’ll be working “Monday Night Football” games this year on the sideline for ESPN.