Kenny Florian Suspended by Fox Sports for Plagiarism

Former UFC title contender and current Fox Sports analyst Kenny Florian has been suspended by the broadcaster after it was found that he plagiarized portions of an article published this week.

Fox Sports PR issued the following statement on Saturday via Twitter:

It is vitally important that FOX Sports and FOXSports.com maintain credibility and trust with their readers, viewers and fans. FOX UFC on-air personality Kenny Florian is being suspended beginning immediately for a critical oversight in a story posted earlier this week on FOXSports.com. Florian has admitted and regrets his mistake and apologized for the error.

The story in question, posted Monday on FoxSports.com, is Florian’s analysis of this weekend’s UFC bantamweight title fight between T.J. Dillashaw and Dominick Cruz. In it, Florian copied or reworded numerous sentences contained in a December video uploaded to YouTube by boxing analyst Lee Wylie.

Fox Sports initially added an editor’s note to the article stating that the piece “borrow[ed]” from Wylie’s work and that the organization regretted the “oversight.” The text has since been removed.

Florian on Saturday posted an explanation of his version of events on Twitter, stating that he had contacted Wylie to apologize. Wylie later wrote that it is “not the end of the world.”