Following months of keeping quiet about his arrest and subsequent plea deal after a public altercation with his girlfriend, former ESPN sports commentator Jay Mariotti broke his silence on "Real Talk With Jason Whitlock," reports SportsNewser.com.

Mariotti blamed his career downfall on AOL Sports, where he had been writing online sports stories He said the company urged him to settle the case and accept a misdemeanor plea bargain so Jay could resume work. ESPN cut Mariotti loose from "Around the Horn" in part because AOL had suspended him, and he has yet to be invited back.

Mariotti declared that if he had known that AOL Sports was working behind the scenes with The Sporting News and Arianna Huffington on a plan to eliminate sports positions, he would have reconsidered accepting AOL’s advice. He said he wishes now that he had fought the case and had a chance to clear his name.

“Instead, I accepted a plea on what my boss at AOL was telling me and in the end, it turns out his bosses were plotting to get rid of the entire sports structure at AOL,” Mariotti said.