Steve Phillips Fired, Checks into Treatment Facility: For Sex Addiction?

After watching and reading and listening to all the articles and posts and stories and photos of the Steve Phillips scandal, it seemed a mere inevitability that the ESPN sports analyst would eventually be fired. And he was -- Sunday evening. As timing would have it, the announcement came at about the same time as the last American League Championship Series game was getting underway. ESPN stated that they had to "part ways" with former New York Mets general manager Steve Phillips. Steve Phillips' representative said that he would be "voluntarily admitting himself to an inpatient treatment facility to address his personal issues." Which only leads one to ask, given all the information about sex scandals and affairs the baseball sports analyst has been involved in: Is Steve Phillips a sex addict?

Some will no doubt laugh at the thought, adhering to the belief that most people are likely to be sex addicts. But there is a branch of thought in the psychological community that believes that sex is and can be addictive and said faction treats addiction to sex much like they would treat any other addiction -- with therapy.

Steve Phillips self-admission into an inpatient treatment facility may be for various other "issues" but given his admitted history of infidelity and string of affairs while a general manager with the New York Mets, sex addiction may be the central addiction (or only addiction) he may be addressing. Nor would he be the first celebrity to admit to such an addiction.

Actor David Duchovny, star of Showtime's "Californication" and Fox' "The X-Files," checked himself into a facility for treatment for his sex addiction in August 2008. Other celebrities who have admitted to sex addiction are Charlie Sheen ("Two and a Half Men") and Michael Douglas ("Wall Street"), who signed a pre-nuptial agreement with current wife Catherine Zeta-Jones ("The Mask Of Zorro"), where she would receive millions if he were found to be unfaithful.

Why would anyone think Steve Phillips might be a sex addict? Part of the definition of sex addiction is the engaging in sexual activity to the detriment of personal and professional relationships, of which Steve Phillips has certainly been guilty (admittedly so).

In 1998 he settled a sexual harassment lawsuit with Rita Rodriguez, a former New York Mets employee with whom he publicly admitted having sex. He took a leave of absence and would later admit to having a string of sexual affairs while employed as the general manager of the New York Mets. He admitted to having an affair with Brooke Hundley to his wife, Marni Phillips, in August after she began receiving ominous and threatening phone calls from Hundley. Those calls, a letter containing information about their sexual encounters where she was caught in the Phillips driveway delivering it, and an alleged online relationship with the Phillips' 16-year-old son (where she posed as a classmate to gain information from him) led to Marni Phillips filing for divorce on September 14.

All of these incidents of affairs and sexual encounters would certainly fit the definition of sexual activity detrimental to Phillips' personal and professional relationships. Ultimately his actions have resulted in his losing his wife and being fired from ESPN.

Of course, it may not be sex addiction for which Steve Phillips has admitted himself into the inpatient treatment facility. But it might be an "issue" that he might want to look into...

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Sources:

NYDailyNews.com
PsychCentral.com