Is it still up for question whether or not this was meant seriously? He was at an awards luncheon giving an award to his in-house publicist in front of an audience of fellow publicists. If, perhaps, he'd said this in a one-on-one interview, that would be one thing. The context is he was trying to get a laugh out of an audience that has experience in trying to sell "dogs." He was being ironic to an audience that would find that specific irony (an award for a guy whose biggest "score" was selling what is generally the consensus "best" of one of the most successful series of all time) funny. If that's not obvious "ball breaking", I don't know what is.