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🎤 QUICK START ✍️

📺 Pronunciation police. Cris Collinsworth spent Sunday night emphatically pronouncing Marcus Mariota's name as "Mah-ree-OH-tah" with the final syllable emphasized, confusing viewers who've heard it said differently for a decade. The technically correct pronunciation became the story of the night, with Mina Kimes joking she was rooting for Commanders touchdowns just to hear Collinsworth say it with "the lil flourish."

🏀 Bucket list moment. Dick Vitale will finally call an NCAA Tournament game after twice turning down CBS offers out of loyalty to ESPN. The 86-year-old will team with Charles Barkley for a First Four matchup in March on TruTV, plus Kentucky-Indiana on Dec. 13.

🏈 Reality check. J.J. Watt pushed back on the idea that full-time NFL referees would fix officiating problems after Thanksgiving's controversial calls. "I can be as hard on refs as anyone," Watt wrote, "but I am not convinced that 'full time' refs fixes the frustrating issues. You have to remember that these are still humans at the end of the day."

🎙️ False alarm. Clippers announcers Brian Sieman and Jim Jackson spent much of the third quarter arguing about a trivia question on-air, sparking concerns about underlying tension. Jackson clarified it was all banter: "Because the camera wasn't on us, the listening audience couldn't see that we were both smiling and laughing while having this convo."

💰 Math problem. Adam Schefter wondered why Ole Miss didn't match LSU's offer to keep Lane Kiffin, prompting Paul Finebaum to correct him on Get Up: "First of all, the money was going to be the same everywhere. Ole Miss was not gonna let him get away for a couple of million dollars." The Athletic’s Stewart Mandel confirmed the offers were "nearly identical."

🚨 LEADING OFF 🚨

When College GameDay puts its thumb on the scale

The Lane Kiffin saga ended Sunday exactly as everyone with functioning brain cells knew it would. Ole Miss announced Pete Golding as its head coach for the College Football Playoff. Kiffin boarded a plane to Baton Rouge. And the Rebels get to spend the next three weeks explaining to recruits why their coach left for a conference rival before they could play in the biggest games in program history.

What won't end anytime soon is the question of how ESPN's College GameDay spent the better part of two weeks actively lobbying for an outcome that made zero business sense for anyone involved except Lane Kiffin.

Nick Saban went on GameDay on Nov. 22 and declared this wasn't "a Lane Kiffin conundrum" but "a college football conundrum." Kirk Herbstreit argued Saturday that Ole Miss should "set emotions aside" and let Kiffin coach the Rebels through the CFP even after accepting the LSU job.

The unanimous verdict from ESPN's two most prominent college football voices: Ole Miss should let their departing coach stick around for another month with full access to the program, complete control of the roster, and presumably full freedom to recruit those same players to leave with him for Baton Rouge.

“I think they should let Lane coach his team, number one,” Saban said over the weekend.

College GameDay didn't just report on the Lane Kiffin story. It campaigned for a specific ending. And when Ole Miss refused to play along, Kiffin told ESPN's Marty Smith on the tarmac Sunday that "maybe all the national people understand why he should let me coach, but he has to live here."

The "national people" Kiffin referenced weren't hard to identify. They'd spent the previous week saying it on television.

This isn't about whether College GameDay is popular or effective. Pat McAfee has revitalized the show into must-watch television. The energy works. The viral moments work. The ratings prove it.

This is about something different. This is about ESPN's flagship college football program deciding it knows better than the people actually running these schools, then using its enormous platform to browbeat them into compliance.

College GameDay isn't new to this. The show has a long history of leveraging its influence to shape narratives rather than just cover them.

When Washington State dared complain about getting left behind in conference realignment, Pat McAfee tore into the Cougars on air, asking if they were showing Ol' Crimson "when they were 1-11 in 2009" and telling them to "shut up" because they should be grateful ESPN gives them any attention at all. And if that sounds familiar, it's because his good buddy, Kirk Herbstreit, previously told Pac-12 coaches they "should be thanking ESPN" for broadcasting their games at terrible time slots instead of complaining about those same time slots.

When Herbstreit did a four-and-a-half-minute monologue about Miami's program direction in 2021, the school fired Manny Diaz and threw $80 million at Mario Cristobal. One segment changed the trajectory of two major programs because College GameDay carries that kind of weight.

When Group of Five schools push for playoff access, Herbstreit has spent years explaining why they don't deserve it, despite mocking people who said Cincinnati couldn't make the playoff in 2021 after ESPN had already decided the Bearcats would make the playoff.

When players skip bowl games to preserve their NFL futures, Herbstreit and Desmond Howard lectured them about not "loving football" enough. Never mind that ESPN owns most of those bowl games and benefits financially from players showing up.

When GameDay wants something to happen, its hosts don't just advocate for that outcome. They frame opposition as stupid, emotional, or selfish.

That's precisely what happened with Lane Kiffin.

As we mentioned above, Saban absolved Kiffin of responsibility by declaring it a "college football conundrum" rather than acknowledging that Kiffin could have ended the distraction at any time by committing to Ole Miss or waiting until after the season to explore other jobs. Herbstreit told Ole Miss to "set emotions aside," implying that basic business logic — not letting a departing employee serve two SEC programs simultaneously — was somehow rooted in feelings rather than common sense.

Booger McFarland said the only reason Ole Miss wouldn't let Kiffin finish the season was "personal feelings," as if preventing your rival's new coach from recruiting your roster for a month is irrational rather than obvious.

The narrative was clear: Lane Kiffin wanted to coach both teams. Ole Miss should get out of the way.

Look, nobody's claiming there was some grand conspiracy coordinated by CAA or ESPN executives. But when Nick Saban — Lane Kiffin's former boss, current mentor, and the guy Kiffin publicly said he was calling for advice — goes on ESPN to argue that Kiffin deserves to coach both schools, it's hard to call that analysis when you're actively involved in the decision. Which we now know that he was.

When Kirk Herbstreit spends Saturday morning telling Ole Miss administrators how to run their program despite not understanding that Kiffin's contract had already automatically extended through 2031, it's worth noting that Herbstreit isn't operating with complete information but is speaking with complete authority anyway.

When multiple ESPN voices repeat the same talking points — "let him finish what he started," "do it for the players," "set emotions aside" — across multiple shows and broadcasts, it stops looking like independent analysis and starts looking like coordinated messaging.

ESPN didn't create the Lane Kiffin situation. But ESPN's most prominent personalities spent two weeks trying to dictate how it should end, and they did so with the kind of confidence that only comes from knowing their voices carry enough weight actually to influence the outcome.

That's the uncomfortable reality about College GameDay's role in the sport. The show isn't just covering college football anymore. It's actively shaping it. And when schools don't cooperate with the preferred narrative, GameDay's hosts don't just disagree. They treat resistance as proof of incompetence.

The problem isn't that Saban and Herbstreit had opinions about what Ole Miss should do. The problem is they used ESPN's biggest platform to present those opinions as self-evident truths while dismissing any counterargument as emotional or irrational.

No serious business would let a departing executive stick around for a month with full access to proprietary information and staff while they transition to a direct competitor.

But College GameDay's position wasn't that Ole Miss had a tough choice to make. It was that Ole Miss had one obvious choice and was being petty for not making it.

Dan Wetzel, Jon Solomon, Jemele Hill, Rodger Sherman, Steven Godfrey, Alex Kirshner, and several others all called out the absurdity of ESPN's argument. The pushback wasn't coming from Ole Miss homers or people with agendas. It was coming from respected college football media figures who recognized that letting Kiffin coach both schools made zero sense outside of a television studio where maximizing drama matters more than competitive reality.

College GameDay wields significant influence over how college football is perceived and discussed. That influence can be used responsibly, or it can be weaponized. And the Lane Kiffin saga showed what happens when GameDay decides to put its thumb on the scale.

ESPN's coverage didn't cause Keith Carter to deny Kiffin's request to finish the season. Carter made that decision because it was the only logical decision available. But GameDay's efforts to frame that decision as wrong, emotional, or unfair created a narrative that Kiffin himself cited Sunday as proof that "national people" understood his side better than the administrator who actually has to live with the consequences.

College GameDay is the most important show in college football. It sets the agenda, drives the conversation, and influences how millions of fans understand the sport.

But with that kind of power comes responsibility. And spending two weeks telling Ole Miss how to handle their departing coach while presenting every counterargument as emotional or irrational isn't just bad analysis. It's College GameDay deciding it knows better than everyone else and using its platform to make sure everyone knows it.

The Lane Kiffin story ended Sunday. The questions about how ESPN's flagship show uses its platform are just beginning.

🎺 AROUND AA 🎺

ESPN spent Saturday doing what it does best: broadcasting massive college football games that justify its billions in rights fees. Oklahoma-LSU determined a playoff spot. Diego Pavia cemented his Heisman invitation. Alabama survived the Iron Bowl. All compelling, high-stakes stuff that ESPN paid enormous amounts of money to own.

But if you were watching on Saturday, the message you received between every quarter and studio segment was clear: None of this matters because wrestling's on tonight.

Awful Announcing contributor Demetri Ravanos argues ESPN's relentless promotion of WWE events has fundamentally changed what the network is. It's not that wrestling appears on ESPN platforms — that's a business decision Disney made after paying significant money for WWE rights. It's that the network treats its biggest football, basketball, and hockey games like appetizers when there's a Premium Live Event on the app.

The wrestling-ification of ESPN programming was already underway before the WWE partnership became official. Joe Tessitore works college football Saturdays and WWE Raw on Mondays. Pat McAfee brings his wrestling swagger to College GameDay. First Take stopped being a sports debate show and became a platform for Stephen A. Smith to develop storylines with celebrity run-ins.

But something shifted when ESPN started interrupting Lane Kiffin coverage to remind viewers they should really be watching Mysterio (not Rey) on the app. The network that used to take sports seriously now treats every minute as inventory to cross-promote something that — regardless of the athletic skill involved — features predetermined outcomes.

Disney paid for WWE content because it's big, event programming that brings loyal audiences to ESPN+. That's understandable. What's harder to understand is why ESPN's pendulum has swung so far from what made sports fans loyal to the network in the first place toward something that fundamentally isn't a sport.

Click to read the full piece on why ESPN's WWE obsession represents a culture shock for longtime viewers.

👏 INDUSTRY INSIGHTS 🗣️

• NBC teased the return of "MJ: Insights to Excellence" after more than a month off the air, with Michael Jordan's next segment airing Tuesday. The month-long hiatus sparked questions about whether the network ran out of material from the original interview, or if this marks a second sit-down with Jordan. NBC declined to provide additional information.

• ESPN Bet officially died Monday as Penn Entertainment rebranded its betting platform as theScore Bet, and ESPN announced DraftKings as its "official sportsbook and odds provider." DraftKings will be exclusively integrated across ESPN's ecosystem with a full rollout expected in 2026, powering the betting tab within the ESPN app.

• Netflix is "likely" to renew Quarterback for Season 3, according to Sports Business Journal. The docuseries co-produced by Peyton Manning's Omaha Productions earned 12.7 million views during the second half of 2023, far outperforming spinoff Receiver (7.5 million views). Given the two-year gap between Seasons 1 and 2, Season 3 would likely be filmed in 2026 and follow the show's every-other-year pattern.

• Denver Nuggets forward Cam Johnson replaced JJ Redick as co-host of The Old Man and the Three podcast after more than a year of searching. Johnson joins Tommy Alter for episodes dropping every Tuesday, with Aaron Gordon as the first guest. Redick left the show in 2024 to become head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers, prompting Alter to relaunch as The Young Man and the Three with rotating co-hosts before bringing back the original brand.

• UFC announced its Paramount+ debut with UFC 324 on Saturday, Jan. 24, featuring Justin Gaethje vs. Paddy Pimblett for the interim lightweight title and Kayla Harrison defending her bantamweight championship against Amanda Nunes. The $7.7 billion media rights deal marks the end of UFC's pay-per-view model, with Paramount+ subscribers receiving access to monthly numbered events at no additional charge.

📣 NOTABLE QUOTABLES 🗣️

"You got this team to the playoff, and you walked. It's unforgivable in my opinion. I don't care if it's the Dallas Cowboys. I don't care if it's the freaking Monstars. You don't leave your team before you're going to the playoffs." - ESPN's Cole Cubelic ripping Lane Kiffin on McElroy and Cubelic in the Morning for abandoning Ole Miss before their first College Football Playoff appearance.

"If you go, then go. Don't disrupt the program. Don't take any of those coaches. Let them stay there and finish the job you left because you didn't want to finish it." - CBS's Bill Cowher blasting Lane Kiffin for attempting to gut Ole Miss's offensive staff on his way to LSU, arguing that the school, alumni, and administrative staff who supported Kiffin deserved better than watching him dismantle the program on his way out.

"Rex Ryan really sat there and defended Lane Kiffin, and in the same breath, criticized college players for leveraging similar opportunities. Lane Kiffin has done this multiple times. Brian Kelly and other coaches have done it, too. They were doing this before NIL ever came into..." - Jemele Hill calling out the double standard after Rex Ryan defended Kiffin leaving Ole Miss while simultaneously criticizing players who "bail all the time" for transfer portal opportunities and NIL money.

"The last person to put up this much yards, God rest his soul, was O. J. Simpson, respectfully." - Cam Newton on First Take referencing O.J. Simpson's 1975 performance against Pittsburgh while discussing the Bills' rushing attack, adding an unnecessary expression of sympathy for Simpson, who died in 2024 and remains better known for being accused of murdering his ex-wife and her friend than for his football accomplishments.

"They won't let me down there. It's like the crown jewels down there. I've wanted to go down and sit in a session and see what they do in preparation. It's never gonna happen." - SNY's Keith Hernandez claiming the Mets refuse to let him attend analytics meetings despite his Hall of Fame defensive career, adding that the last time anyone asked for his help was when Todd Zeile transitioned to first base under Bobby Valentine more than 25 years ago.

️‍🔥 THE CLOSER 🔥

The sport needs Lane Kiffin, even if nobody wants to admit it

ESPN's E60 documentary on Lane Kiffin already feels outdated, and it aired less than two months ago.

The hour-long profile tracked Kiffin's journey from wunderkind to punchline to redemption story, culminating in his turning down Auburn to stay at Ole Miss. The subtext was clear: Kiffin had found peace in Oxford through sobriety, hot yoga, and a healthier relationship with his job. The reformed villain staying put at the program he built felt like the natural ending to a complicated career.

Then he left for LSU before Ole Miss could play in the College Football Playoff, boarding a plane to Baton Rouge. At the same time, hundreds of fans screamed obscenities at him and reminded everyone that Lane Kiffin hasn't changed nearly as much as that documentary suggested.

Awful Announcing's Ben Axelrod argues that whether you love him or hate him, Kiffin represents something college football desperately needs: a genuine character who makes people feel something.

Nobody else in the sport could generate a month-long saga like this. Sure, it would be a story if Kirby Smart or Ryan Day left mid-playoff. But Kiffin carries baggage that those coaches don't. He accused Urban Meyer of cheating on his first day at Tennessee. He claimed Mississippi State broke into Ole Miss' locker room to steal his quarterback's jersey before the Egg Bowl. He confronted a reporter for invoking a Ludacris lyric when discussing his job-hopping history.

The E60 episode now feels less like journalism and more like coordinated image rehabilitation, designed to make Kiffin more appealing for the exact kind of job he just took. But that doesn't make his story any less compelling. The footage of him discussing hot yoga and recalling his bizarre relationship with Al Davis remains entertaining. The arc of a prodigy who hit rock bottom, clawed his way back to the top, then immediately repeated his villainous behavior is genuinely Shakespearean.

With all due respect to Dabo Swinney and Curt Cignetti, nobody currently coaching elicits the kind of visceral reactions Kiffin does. When Ole Miss plays at LSU next season, the hatred will be real. When LSU visits Oxford, the vitriol will be genuine. These aren't manufactured storylines. These are actual emotions from people who care deeply about their programs and feel betrayed by someone they trusted.

"Everybody feel a way about K, but at least y'all feel something," Kanye West rapped on 2004's "Bring Me Down."

That's Lane Kiffin's place in college football. He makes people feel something. Whether that's admiration, disgust, fascination, or rage depends entirely on your perspective. But indifference? That's the one emotion Kiffin will never generate.

College football needs villains. It needs characters who generate real storylines rather than sanitized corporate-speak. It requires coaches who aren't afraid to be polarizing, even when that means burning every bridge they've ever built.

Lane Kiffin is one of the last coaches willing to be that person. The sport is better for it, even if nobody in Oxford wants to hear that right now.

Click to read Ben's whole piece on why Kiffin's chaos makes college football more compelling.