Irony isn’t dead. It’s alive and well on ESPN, where Paul Finebaum spent Sunday explaining why Indiana’s Curt Cignetti is “unlikable.”
The same Paul Finebaum who’s considering a 2026 Senate run in Alabama — where voters will literally decide whether they find him likable enough to represent them in Washington — dedicated significant airtime on The Matt Barrie Show to breaking down why he can’t stand the coach who’s won 17 games in two seasons at a program that hadn’t won 10 games in a single season before he arrived.
“No,” Finebaum told Matt Barrie when asked if he finds Cignetti likable. “The answer’s pretty simple. I think you know me. I shoot straight. I respect him to no end, but he’s brash, he’s over-the-top. He’s had the last laugh, which is a really great attribute for somebody who’s successful. And he’s probably laughing right now watching this, going, ‘The guy with no hair gave me no shot. He laughed at me, and look at who’s got the last laugh now.'”
Cignetti has certainly given Finebaum ammunition. He told reporters to “Google me” after his first National Signing Day at Indiana. He said the Hoosiers “beat the sh*t” out of Top 25 teams before the Notre Dame playoff game — a quote that aged poorly after a 27-17 loss. He’s defended Indiana’s scheduling by comparing it to SEC programs, which Finebaum called making “a complete fool out of himself.”
That swagger has grated on Finebaum since day one. After the Notre Dame loss, he told The Matt Barrie Show that “it just bothered me to hear Curt Cignetti run his mouth, talking like he’s actually done something.”
What Cignetti had done was go 11-1 at a program that went 9-27 in the three years before his arrival — a program that hadn’t won 10 games in a single season before he showed up. But Finebaum remained unimpressed. He called Indiana’s schedule “embarrassing” when the team was ranked No. 5 last November. He predicted they “won’t come within 1,000 miles” of the CFP this season.
Indiana is now 6-0 and coming off a statement win over No. 3 Oregon in Eugene. The Hoosiers are firmly entrenched in the playoff conversation. But even then, none of that success has softened Finebaum’s stance on whether it can continue.
“No, it’s not,” he said when Barrie asked if Indiana’s run is sustainable. “I just don’t think it is. We’ve seen a lot of coaches that have stayed at the roulette wheel too long. And I think Cignetti’s at an age where he’s thinking, ‘I probably have another move left. Where is it, and for how much?’ And I would encourage him to think about it because I just think at some point, you’ll get the wrong quarterback, you’ll miss a little bit, and will crash like triple witching hour on Wall Street.”
He added, “Now, by the way, I would’ve gone broke betting against Indiana this year. But that’s just my gut feeling, having watched college football for a very long time.”
That gut feeling has been wrong about Cignetti for two consecutive seasons. It hasn’t changed Finebaum’s mind about him, or apparently about his own track record of predictions.
At some point, “unlikable” and “wrong” become a package deal. Cignetti might be brash, but he’s 17-2 in two seasons at Indiana. Finebaum might shoot straight, but he’s missed the target on this one twice.
About Sam Neumann
Since the beginning of 2023, Sam has been a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. A 2021 graduate of Temple University, Sam is a Charlotte native, who currently calls Greenville, South Carolina his home. He also has a love/hate relationship with the New York Mets and Jets.