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🎤 QUICK START ✍️

🏈 The CW out of Inside. On Thursday night, Puck’s John Ourand reported that The CW has opted not to renew its contract with the long-running NFL Films production Inside the NFL. The show has spent the last two seasons on The CW after having aired on Paramount+ for a few seasons prior. Per Ourand, “the league has opened talks wi several interested parties,” but nothing is imminent.

📺 The Peter Schrager Show. ESPN has been toying with ideas to fill its 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. ET windows, and the network’s newest talent hire seems like a front-runner for a slot. Earlier this month, CNBC reported that ESPN was considering Schrager for the early afternoon. Now, The Athletic’s Andrew Marchnd is saying there’s a “very good chance” that Schrager gets a show, but likely not as a solo act, rather as part of an ensemble.

🏒 Capitals backtrack. The Washington Capitals inadvertently sent an email to season ticket holders on Thursday indicating that star player Alex Ovechkin was entering his final season in the NHL. That would be news to, well, everybody. So far, the NHL’s new all-time leading goal scorer has been mum about his future past next season, which he’s committed to playing. The Caps issued a statement on social media to correct the gaffe.

📣 Horns up. Viewership figures are in for last Friday’s series finale of Around the Horn. 482,000 viewers tuned in to see host Tony Reali reenact Goodfellas and watch an octet of legendary panelists give their final goodbyes. The audience was, predictably, much larger than the show’s recent run of episodes (which averaged 362,000 viewers in March and April). Ratings juggernaut Pardon the Interruption scared up 649,000 viewers half an hour later.

️‍🚨LEADING OFF 🚨

College football schedule comes into focus

We’re still months away from the opening kickoff of college football season, but the networks took Thursday to highlight some marquee matchups to look forward to.

As a quick refresher, we’re now in Year 2 of our “new normal” when it comes to college football. ESPN owns exclusive rights to the SEC, and last year took full advantage by scheduling SEC on ABC tripleheaders most Saturdays throughout the season. This year, based on the schedule ESPN has revealed so far, it seems to be more of the same (highlights below).

Looking at the other Power-2 conference, Big Ten rights are now split between Fox, CBS, and NBC, with Fox being the league’s lead partner. Much to the chagrin of Ohio State fans, the network will continue putting its marquee inventory in the Big Noon Kickoff window. CBS will again air a Big Ten game at 3:30 p.m. ET, replacing its old SEC on CBS package. And NBC will round out Big Ten Saturdays in primetime, sans a few nighttime Notre Dame games from South Bend.

The ACC will stay status quo as well, with the vast majority of the conference’s games airing on the ESPN family of networks while the leftovers will go to The CW. The Big 12 will continue its new rights deals with ESPN, Fox, and TNT as well.

Now that the housekeeping is out of the way, let’s take a look at each network’s highlights this upcoming season.

Fox

• Week 1 — Auburn @ Baylor (Friday night)

• Week 1 — Texas @ Ohio State (Big Noon Kickoff)

• Week 2 — Iowa @ Iowa State (Big Noon Kickoff)

• Week 3 — Oregon @ Northwestern (Big Noon Kickoff)

• Week 14 — Ohio State @ Michigan (Big Noon Kickoff)

• Mountain West Championship (Friday, Dec. 5)

• Big Ten Championship (Saturday, Dec. 6)

ESPN

• Week 0 — Iowa State vs. Kansas State (Dublin, Ireland)

• Week 1 — Alabama @ Florida State

• Week 1 — LSU @ Clemson

• Week 1 — Notre Dame @ Miami (Sunday night)

• Week 1 — TCU @ North Carolina (Labor Day, Bill Belichick debut)

• Week 2 — Michigan @ Oklahoma

• Week 7 — Oklahoma vs. Texas (Red River Rivalry, 3:30 p.m. ET)

• Big 12 Championship Game (Saturday, Dec. 6)

• SEC Championship Game (Saturday, Dec. 6)

• ACC Championship Game (Saturday, Dec. 6)

CBS

• Week 1 — Nevada @ Penn State

• Week 2 — Oklahoma State @ Oregon

• Week 3 — USC @ Purdue

• Week 4 — Michigan @ Nebraska

• Army vs. Navy (Saturday, Dec. 13)

NBC

• Week 3 — Texas A&M @ Notre Dame

• Week 5 — Oregon @ Penn State (Whiteout game)

• Week 8 — USC @ Notre Dame

• Week 14 — Indiana @ Purdue (Black Friday)

👀AROUND AA📰

Anthony Edwards is officially the NBA’s newest take magnet

Why has Anthony Edwards emerged as elite morning show debate fodder? The Minnesota Timberwolves star has found himself in the middle of a “face of the NBA” debate that has dominated NBA media this past week. But that’s just the start.

Awful Announcing’s Ben Axelrod examines why Ant finds himself as “a morning show producer’s dream” as opposed to other emerging stars like Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Tyrese Haliburton, or Jalen Brunson.

📣 SOCIAL EXPERIMENT 🌟

“You can never kill the four horseman” — Shaq had some fighting words for anyone writing Inside the NBA’s obituary.

📈💰INDUSTRY INSIGHTS🧐

• The CW is reportedly looking to add more bowl games, according to Ryan Glasspiegel of Front Office Sports. The network continues to pick off live sports rights left and right. In addition to its package of ACC and “Pac-2” football, The CW airs ACC basketball, WWE’s NXT, the NASCAR Xfinity Series, Grand Slam Track, AVP Beach Volleyball, and recently agreed to a deal with the PBA. It’s unclear, however, exactly which bowl games The CW would be targeting. ESPN Events owns, operates, and broadcasts the vast majority of college football’s bowl season, leaving few opportunities for other networks to air bowl games themselves. The CW has aired the Arizona Bowl the past two seasons.

• Welcome to Wrexham has been renewed for a fifth season by FX. The show, which has documented Wrexham AFC every season since celebrity owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney purchased the team, has proven a massive success, as has the team on the pitch. Wrexham have been promoted three consecutive seasons and now find themselves one promotion away from cracking into the English Premier League. Additionally, FX will begin airing a spinoff show called Necaxa this summer, following the storied Liga MX side alongside actress Eva Longoria.

• Cooper Flagg might’ve made a lot more in NIL endorsements than we originally thought. During a conversation between sports reporters Howard Bryant and Bob Costas, Brant revealed that the Duke phenom netter $28 million in endorsements while in college; $13 million from New Balance and $15 million from Fanatics. It’s likely that both contracts extend into his pro career, similar to the deal that Caitlin Clark signed with Nike while in college.

🗣️ NOTABLE QUOTABLES 🗣️

• “I attended Game 4 in Indianapolis. ‘Hoosier Hospitality’… I was embarrassed when somebody under whose direction I don’t know called out some of the people who had made the trip from New York to support their team – and in turn, support our team. The audience booed these people. I’d say that was not Hoosier Hospitality. One could say it’s poor, poor sportsmanship. I was not proud to be a Hoosier, and I lived here my entire life. On behalf of most Hoosiers, I would like to apologize for our poor behavior. I’m sure the Pacers had nothing to do with this smackdown.” — John Mellencamp takes aim at Pat McAfee for calling out the celebrity Knicks fans at Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Finals, causing Pacers fans to boo.

• “The fact is … the NFL has invented events over the years that have become gigantic. Whatever the NFL wants to do, it can do. And if some judge one day says the draft is unconstitutional or whatever, and somebody abolished the draft … and in 2054, there’s no draft, let’s just say. The NFL, at that time, with ‘Commissioner Arch Manning’ will basically say at that time, ‘OK there’s no draft? What event can we figure out? Let’s have a college prospect picking contest to see where they’re going to go, and who are they going to play for?'” — Peter King opining on a future without an NFL Draft.

• Behaving “like an actress and not a judge.” — a public prosecutor accusing one of three judges in the Diego Maradona homicide case of covertly starring in a documentary film about the ongoing trial, compromising her impartiality.