Steve Phillips: Sex Addiction No Excuse

(CBS/ AP)  Former ESPN baseball analyst Steve Phillips had to play hard ball when it came to confronting his actions, which he says in a TV interview were driven by sex addiction.

Before the Tiger Woods scandal broke last fall, the former Mets general manager was thrust into the spotlight when he admitted to having an affair with 22-year-old Brooke Hundley, a production assistant at the cable network.

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Since then, he was fired by ESPN and later checked himself into the Gentle Path sex addiction program at the same Mississippi treatment center that is said to have just finished treating Woods,

But is sex rehab becoming a trend to justify bad judgment and get off the hook or is it legit?

Phillips says it's a real issue for him.

"People look at sex addiction as an excuse; it's not an excuse. I'm fully responsible for everything that I did and accept responsibility for that," Phillips told "Today's" Matt Lauer in an interview Monday.

Phillips, who says he's "broken" his wife's heart, conceded he may just be "broken" inside as well.

"People who go there are broken people," Phillips explained. "That's really the essence of the addiction, that you're broken inside. You've got a hole that you've tried to fill, whether it was with alcohol or drugs or sex or gambling, with whatever.

"You go there and try to get the basics of why did you do what you did," he added. "For most addicts, whether it's alcohol or sex or whatever, it is that you have that hole inside based upon shame and trauma that occurred from childhood."

If that is the case for Phillips, he's been filling a void for a while now.

This isn't the first time that Phillips has encountered a sex scandal in the workplace.

In 1998, Steve Phillips admitted having sex with a Mets employee, who sued for sexual harassment. That case was settled out of court. Phillips was fired by the Mets in 2003.

Marni Phillips filed for divorce Sept. 14, according to court records.