This week, Las Vegas Raiders coach Jon Gruden announced his departure from the team following the release of emails in which Gruden made sexist, homophobic, and transphobic comments. Today, Electronic Arts directly addressed the controversy, pledging to replace Gruden in Madden NFL 22 via an upcoming update. Assistant coach and special teams coordinator Rich Bisaccia has been named as the team’s interim head coach, but it seems that EA will instead add a generic replacement for Gruden as part of the game’s update. The publisher announced the change in a message shared on the game’s official Twitter account.
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“EA Sports is committed to taking action in maintaining a culture of inclusion and equity. Due to the circumstances of Jon Gruden’s resignation, we are taking steps to remove him from Madden NFL 22. We will replace him with a generic likeness via a title update in the coming weeks,” the company wrote on Twitter.
It’s unclear exactly why EA will avoid using Bisaccia, but it’s possible that EA will be able to make the change quicker by using a generic character model, instead of creating a wholly new one. Since Bisaccia is only slated to be the team’s interim coach, it’s also possible that EA is waiting to see if Las Vegas gives him the official title before creating a new character model. While Bisaccia has been in the league for a very long time, this is the first time he’s ever held a head coaching position, and EA might not have wanted to create a model in case his time in the role ends up being brief. EA has not yet announced a specific release date for the title update, but it certainly sounds like it will be arriving very soon!
Madden NFL 22 is currently available on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. You can check out all of our previous coverage of the game right here.
Are you happy to see Gruden removed from Madden NFL 22? Are you disappointed Bisaccia won’t be getting a character model for the game? Let us know in the comments or share your thoughts directly on Twitter at @Marcdachamp to talk about all things gaming!
