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Countdown to Coverage: College Football’s Best TV Show

“College football is all over television on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays. All of those games require A LOT of studio coverage.”

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College football season is nearly here.

Forget last Saturday. It’s called Week 0 for a reason. Do you really want to believe the first game of the 2022 season was 3-9 Northwestern and 3-9 Nebraska playing halfway around the world?

Here at Barrett Sports Media, we are celebrating college football from a media angle. All week long, our editors and resident college football superfans, Arky Shea, Demetri Ravanos and Garrett Searight, will be looking at the best the media has to offer in terms of college football coverage.

The entire schedule is as follows:

MONDAY: Best Local Show

TUESDAY: Best National Radio Show

WEDNESDAY: Best College Football Podcast

THURSDAY: Best TV Show

FRIDAY: Best TV Play-by-Play Booth

College football is all over television on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays. All of those games require A LOT of studio coverage. So who does it best?

Do you prefer the pageantry and storytelling of College Gameday? Maybe the no-nonsense approach of Big Noon Kickoff is more your speed. What if the best TV show isn’t on in a pregame window?

As we inch closer to the inevitable tag team main event featuring the SEC and ESPN versus the Big Ten and FOX, this discussion may end up being the college football media’s most important pissing contest. Here are our picks for college football’s best TV show.

COLLEGE GAMEDAY by Arky Shea

You can debate the validity of any show you want, the king is still ESPN’s College GameDay. The show kicked off it’s 36th season and has lapped the field in terms of college fandom allegiance and tradition. The desk lineup is loaded with names that you associate with the sport: Rece Davis who has deep ties into college football as a graduate of the University of Alabama, Desmond Howard, a Heisman Trophy winner that’s been giving his hot takes since 2005 on GameDay, Kirk Herbstreit who has become the most influential broadcasting voice in the sport. THE MOST. And of course Lee Corso, a man that pioneered something so collegiate, so simple and so brilliant that nobody else can ever do it! Only one man’s headgear prediction matters.

It’s become everyone’s Saturday wake-up call for a reason. There is a chemistry on that set that is so pure that it’s morphed long ago into familial status. There’s not another college football TV show that effortlessly entertains the sport’s diehards until kickoff like GameDay. It will take a lot to knock the crown off their head. The show has spearheaded so many ideas we take for granted about a pregame show like showing up on location, promoting fan’s to bring their own signage and inviting celebrities to the table to beef up the curb appeal. Hands down, College GameDay still reigns.

BIG NOON KICKOFF by Garrett Searight

College GameDay is a lot like my 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee. I loved that car. I had so many memories with it that I will cherish until my dying day. I openly wept the day a man didn’t tie down rabbit cages in the back of his truck and I had to stop on the highway to avoid hitting them and someone rear-ended me and the Jeep was totaled. I was gonna drive that Jeep for another 150,000 miles. And then I switched to a new car, and while I still love that old Jeep, you realized there’s a whole new wave of automotive technology out there.

When Big Noon Kickoff hit the airwaves, I couldn’t help but sample it. Demetri wrote a story a few weeks ago that included the mission of Big Noon Kickoff was to be new and relevant and he couldn’t be more correct. I’m 32 years old. Desmond Howard — who last week said he couldn’t understand how Ohio State quarterback C.J. Stroud, who last year threw for 44 touchdowns and was a Heisman Trophy finalist, was the Heisman frontrunner this year — won the Heisman Trophy the year after I was born. Kirk Herbstreit was Ohio State’s quarterback when I was in diapers. Lee Corso’s last year as a college head coach was a year after my mom graduated high school.

On the flip side, Reggie Bush and Matt Leinart were college football during my formative years. Urban Meyer, while a troubling figure, is great on TV and won a National Championship coaching my favorite school in the last decade. Bob Stoops, who wasn’t nearly as great at TV as Meyer, was as worthy of a replacement as you could find. The Big Noon Kickoff cast is as relevant as one could assemble. Their puzzling insistence on using Clay Travis every Saturday notwithstanding, Big Noon Kickoff’s strictly-football approach is a welcomed change to GameDay’s broader, softer storytelling elements.

COLLEGE FOOTBALL FINAL by Demetri Ravanos

With all due respect to my colleagues, who I think are bright guys, the pregame ain’t it for college football on TV. We pregame all week and then the national media makes a hard pivot to the NFL the second the clock hits zero in Honolulu. A real college football fan knows the value and importance of College Football Final! It’s not just the late-night airing, it is the consecutive reruns on Sunday mornings that give us one last chance to contextualize everything that happened the night before.

The show has had problems in the past. I would argue that Lou Holtz made the show nearly unwatchable for years. I like what they have going now though. Matt Barrie brings the right level of snarkiness to the show alongside experts Joey Galloway and Jessie Palmer. The helmet stickers, the poll projections, the general sense of closure to the week are all needed on a Sunday before those of us that live and die with the college game turn our collective attention to the NFL.

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Report: NFL to Put Christmas Day Doubleheader Up For Bids

Bidding is expected to start at $50 million among the current NFL media partners but some think the games could sell for $75 million to $100 million apiece.

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The NFL will reportedly put its Christmas Day games up for auction, allowing its current media partners to bid for the games. Now, it’s up to CBS, FOX, ESPN, NBC, and Prime Video to pay up for rights to one of these two marquee games.

According to Front Office Sports Michael McCarthy, preference will be given to linear networks, so Prime Video and Peacock may sit this one out. Bidding is expected to start at $50 million but McCarthy and his sources expect that number to rise. John Kosner, the former ESPN executive, thinks the new Christmas Day games could sell for $75 million to $100 million apiece.

The NFL announced a Wednesday Christmas Day doubleheader during its annual league meetings. The league originally said it wouldn’t force games on Christmas Day if the holiday fell on an odd day of the week, though as the NFL continues to put games on days outside of Sundays, Mondays, Thursdays, and sometimes Saturdays, we’re running out of days that don’t feature NFL football.

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Colorado Rockies & DirecTV Reach Agreement to Carry Games on TV

“Colorado sports fans have made DIRECTV the top destination for their favorite local teams. We will continue to work with MLB…so fans can get their games.”

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Colorado Rockies

Breathe easy, Rockies fans — you will be able to watch your club on linear TV this year. At the buzzer, DirecTV and the Colorado Rockies agreed on terms to distribute the team’s games throughout its local service.

Starting today, DirecTV Choice subscribers across Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Southern Idaho, Western Nebraska, and Northern New Mexico can now watch the Rockies on a special channel simply titled, “ROCKIES.” The games will be available on DirecTV and DirecTV STREAM via channel 683.

“Colorado sports fans have made DIRECTV the top destination to get all their favorite local teams,” said Rob Thun, chief content officer of DIRECTV. “We will continue to work with MLB, the NBA, NHL, and other top leagues and their local franchises so the most avid fans can get the games they want while other customers have more choice over the content they want to pay to have in their homes.”

Reports just days ago out of Colorado said there were “no guarantees” the Rockies would not find a TV home in time for Opening Day following the sunsetting of AT&T SportsNet. The only other way to watch the team is to use its direct-to-consumer Rockies.tv streaming service, which fans say is too pricey for a team that lost 103 games last season. Luckily, the team was able to secure a TV home for 2024, though the future is still uncertain.

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Erin Andrews Reveals Infertility Journey in Emotional ‘Today Show’ Interview

FOX reporter Erin Andrews sat down with ‘The Today Show’s’ Kristen Welker to discuss her journey, how Welker’s own journey inspired her, and more.

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Erin Andrews

FOX reporter Erin Andrews shared her story of infertility and surrogacy with NBC’s Today Show. Last summer, Andrews and her husband welcomed a baby boy via surrogate after trying for a decade to get pregnant via IVF, during which she was diagnosed with cervical cancer in 2016. Today, she sat down with Kristen Welker to discuss her journey, how Welker’s own journey inspired her, and more.

Andrews says Welker’s announcement on the Today Show made her think a baby could be possible. “I remember Kristin Welker’s announcement on your show,” Andrews said last year, “and I actually watched that the morning Mac was born, because that just hit me.”

When they finally sat down, Welker asked Andrews why her journey resonated with the sports reporter so much:

“Because I see myself in you. Kristen, the video of you moderating debates after you’re waiting on bad news or maybe you just received it, that’s me. I can tell you every stand-up I’ve done at a football game where I’ve gotten the news that it didn’t work. I’d be talking about Tom Brady going for this record and my record is that I still was failing…I would have chest pains every time I was waiting for the call if it worked, and I knew it wouldn’t work.

Erin Andrews on ‘Today’

Andrews knew surrogacy was the only path to having a child. Although her family’s first attempt failed, her second attempt was a success, and she got to hear her child’s heartbeat for the very first time. The pair discuss the complex emotions that come with surrogacy, saying that bonds with their child could be affected because they didn’t carry their child. However, Welker assured Andrews that those feelings go away once you can talk to your child.

Once her son was born in June, who Andrews called, “a miracle,” she then talks about her child glowingly, talking about how he is just like mom — vocal. “He’s all me,” she says.

Andrews supports Baby Quest, a non-profit that grants money to families in need of IVF or surrogacy to have a baby but don’t have the funds to pursue these expensive treatments. Both Andrews and Welker acknowledged how difficult and unattainable their journies are for some families — and Andrews even used the NFL’s “My Cleats, My Cause” initiative to raise awareness for her cause.

“People don’t need to feel embarrassed that they have a surrogate or are looking for other help,” Andrews said.

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