Former ESPN baseball analyst Steve Phillips spoke out for the first time today since entering sex rehab last year — saying he knew that he had a problem, but “couldn’t stop himself.”
“What I want to do is take ownership [of the problem],” he said in an interview on NBC’s “Today Show.” “I made some mistakes … I’m fully responsible for what I did.”
Phillips, 46, spoke publicly for the first time since he left the Pine Grove Behavioral Health and Addiction Services clinic in Hattiesburg, Miss., the same facility golfer Tiger Woods recently attended.
PHOTOS: STEVE PHILLIPS SEX SCANDAL
“I couldn’t stop myself from doing the things I was doing — even knowing the consequences,” he admitted.
Phillips said he knew last August that he needed help while he was having an affair with ESPN production assistant Brooke Hundley.
The affair, which was made public by The Post, eventually included Hundley contacting Phillips’ wife at their Connecticut home. Hundley, 22, also contacted Phillips’ teenage son through Facebook, prompting the boy’s mom to call 911.
ESPN eventually fired both Phillips, who once served as general manager of the Mets, and Hundley.
“I was going to get help, I knew I needed it,” said Phillips. “I started calling facilities.”
Phillips, who spent 45 days in rehab, said the people who go there “are broken people.”
“That’s really the essence of the addiction, that you’re broken inside,” he added. “You’ve got a hole that you’ve tried to fill, whether it was with alcohol or drugs or sex or gambling with whatever.”
In November, Phillips wife, Marni, filed for divorce. The couple, who has been married for 19 years, has four children.
As for his marriage, Phillips said, “I’ve broken my wife’s heart … I’m working my tail off to save my marriage. I don’t know what the result will be.”
In 1998, while Phillips was with Mets, a co-worker filed a sexual harassment suit against him that forced him to take a brief leave of absence. The case was later settled out of court.
In the interview, Phillips said he knew he had a problem back then — but he didn’t look at it as an addiction.
“I didn’t go to a clinic,” he said. “I just got some local therapy. I tried to manage everything on my own. I didn’t get the appropriate help that I needed.”
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