Dan ‘Big Cat’ Katz: FS1 deal ‘a lot different’ than ESPN ‘Barstool Van Talk’ in 2017

The sports media world is abuzz about the new deal between Fox and Barstool Sports, which will feature founder Dave Portnoy and other Barstool talent, including Dan “Big Cat” Katz, on the network’s college football pregame show as well as a new FS1 studio show.

But this isn’t the first time that Barstool has crossed over onto traditional television. The ill-fated Barstool Van Talk lasted just one episode on ESPN2 before tensions in Bristol boiled over around Portnoy’s and Katz’s comments about then-ESPN host Sam Ponder. After Van Talk was canned, then-ESPN president John Skipper remarked that the Worldwide Leader was not as able to distance itself from Barstool content as it hoped when it partnered on the standalone show.

In new comments about the Fox deal on Thursday, “Big Cat” explained why he believes this is a better opportunity — and why the wider sports media is more ready for a Barstool TV show than it was a decade ago.

“The world’s changed,” Katz said Thursday on The Yak, “and (FS1) realize, whenever Barstool Van Talk got canceled, 2017, look, (Pat) McAfee’s thriving. Shane Gillis just did the ESPYs last night. I think the world is changing, I think people understand entertainment is entertainment.”

Big Cat gives us the scoop on the FOX Sports deal. Presented by @rhoback pic.twitter.com/9lYoOjnD58

— The Yak (@BarstoolYak) July 17, 2025

Indeed, Barstool’s brand of crass, edge-lord, reality TV-style content is more accepted today. Lines are blurring between the internet and traditional media, and they may soon no longer exist. As much as ESPN and Ponder had a right to be insulted by what Portnoy and Katz said then, it is remarkably not all that different from what one might hear from Pat McAfee, Shannon Sharpe, or Stephen A. Smith in 2025.

That’s not to say Barstool is in the clear. Mainstays at the company are still reticent to engage with its extensive history of racism, misogyny, and harassment.

While Katz did not directly comment on that history during his discussion of the new Fox partnership, he argued that times have changed and, under this deal, “we get to be Barstool.”

“I think that’s the point is we don’t need to change. We get to be Barstool. We get to talk about what we think is funny, what we think is important,” Katz added.

“Even the set, we were talking about the set as like, should we have a desk? It’s like, no. I don’t want a desk. Because then we’re just going to be the exact same show that’s on ESPN or that’s on Fox later in the day.”

From the set to the tone to the topics, the new show on FS1 will be a thoroughly Barstool product.

“I think it’s going to be a lot of our audience tuning in,” Katz added. “And I think it’s going to be a lot different than the ESPN deal we did back in 2017, where I think Fox is a very willing partner that reached out to us, you know what I mean? So it feels different in that they want us, not we’re asking them, ‘Please, please put us on at 1 in the morning.”