(8-1-2006) - Whit Bazemore denies he was giving anyone "the finger" during Sunday's ESPN2 telecast.

"I was not making an inappropriate gesture to anyone. I was telling a young fan to wait a minute while I went back into the trailer to retrieve a Sharpie," Bazemore said. "If you study the TV footage in slow motion you can see that it is clearly my index finger. It does look suspect in real time, but I would never flip someone off in the presence of fans, especially young ones, who had started to crowd around when I walked out behind the car to pack the parachute.

"Plus, I do not know Scott Kalitta well enough to make that kind of gesture, even jokingly, and I had no reason to do it anyway.

"I am extremely disappointed in ESPN's lack of discretion to air something that is so misleading."