According to the New York Post and other outlets ESPN staff engaged in a years -long scheme to submit fake names to the Emmys to get award statues which were re-engraved for on-air personalities:

Stars such as Lee Corso (fake name: “Lee Clark”), Kirk Herbstreit (“Kirk Henry”), Chris Fowler (“Chris Fulton”), Desmond Howard (“Dirk Howard”), Tom Rinaldi (“Tim Richard”) and Samantha Ponder (“Steven Ponder”) were among those to receive the ill-gotten Emmys.

Here is a link to the Post article:https://nypost.com/2024/01/11/sports/espn-busted-for-using-fake-names-in-brazen-emmys-scheme/

The article claims the involved on-air personalities were not aware of the scheme.

Just shows how corrupt ESPN has become.