Kendall Gill Suspended From His TV Job For Punching Tim Doyle

Tim Doyle is certainly used to suffering beatdowns at the hands of Illinois from his playing career, and that continued last night at the hands of Kendall Gill.

Per CBS Chicago:

Gill was apparently upset about comments Doyle made about Gill’s analysis of the previous night’s Bulls game. According to Ecker’s account of the incident: "Mr. Gill approached Mr. Doyle and called him out for his comments, which escalated to a shoving match and ultimately Mr. Gill throwing a punch at Mr. Doyle. The two bumped up against a sign on the wall and a small amount of blood was drawn (though it was unclear exactly how) before the two were separated."

So what did Doyle say to draw the ire of Gill? Well apparently, there was a controversial call at the end of Monday night's Bulls-Nuggets game that cost the Bulls the game, and Gill, a studio analyst for CSN Chicago, spent much of the post-game bemoaning how the Bulls had gotten screwed. Then Doyle went on CSN Chicago the next night and called out Gill personally. Why was Gill so upset: Well, judge for yourself [emphasis added]:

"The call on Noah was 100 percent correct," Doyle said on the show. "I do not know what Stacey King was thinking, Kendall Gill after the game, both of you are my friends, but I unfollowed you on Twitter because they were 100 percent wrong."

Ummmm. While this is rather obnoxious, it doesn't seem to warrant a punch. Any guesses on what Doyle said after the show, or was this just a case of the straw that broke the camel's back?

What's always struck me about Tim Doyle is how much disdain most Northwestern fans seem to have for him. I always hate it when writers try to speak for an entire fanbase, but in my interactions with NU fans here and on Twitter, I've gotten the impression he's nearly universally disliked, even by some media members. And while it's not unprecedented for most NU fans to dislike an NU alum media member, Doyle is a different story because he was an NU athlete and somehow was NU's second best player during his senior year. Of course, the time he called his own fan base "fair-weather fans" and "a joke" probably didn't help his cause,

Maybe I'm only speaking for myself here, but just what is it that makes NU fans dislike one of their own so much? Because if just about any other former player got punched out by a former Illinois player, I feel like said Illinois player would become Public Enemy #1. But in Doyle's case, all I'm hearing is jokes about whether or not the fight messed up Doyle's perfectly coiffed hair.