ESPN’s cut-ins to Aaron Judge at-bats impacted a lot of college football games, including the Tulane Green Wave’s wild 27-24 road win in overtime against the Houston Cougars Friday. That game was regularly disrupted by cut-ins, including on the game-tying drive late:
As promised, Tulane and Houston fans get their Aaron Judge cut-in. pic.twitter.com/cJ4Xa8JApB
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) September 30, 2022
Tulane and Houston playing football featuring Aaron Judge 🤢 pic.twitter.com/honHLDMdDK
— The Transfer Portal CFB (@TPortalCFB) September 30, 2022
This is UNREAL
AARON JUDGE ISN’T EVEN HITTING RN THE PITCHER IS WARMING UP WHILE TULANE IS TRYING TO TIE THIS GAME IN THE FINAL MINUTES
😡😡😡 pic.twitter.com/TmcvGuOYM5
— The Transfer Portal CFB (@TPortalCFB) October 1, 2022
And that led to plenty of annoyed tweets:
Hey ESPN, I can assure you that anyone watching Tulane vs Houston on a Friday night has no interest in what Aaron Judge is doing… pic.twitter.com/CDAh9nq9fq
— Patrick Netherton (@PTNetherton) October 1, 2022
ESPN making me watch Aaron Judge during Houston-Tulane just for him to strikeout pic.twitter.com/LVHjFaLqVf
— Joel Haas (@Joel_Haas1) September 30, 2022
https://twitter.com/FTBeard7/status/1576028668647723009
It also led to Tulane’s official athletics feed having to make it clear they didn’t ask for fans to be force-fed Judge at-bats:
Hey @espn, do you mind?
— Tulane Green Wave (@TulaneAthletics) October 1, 2022
And to Houston’s athletics PR feed noting this wasn’t their call:
For fans tuning into @UHCougarFB vs. Tulane (6 p.m. CT kickoff): @espn will cut into tonight’s coverage for live look-ins to at-bats for Aaron Judge, who is in pursuit of breaking Roger Maris’s single-season AL home run record.
— Houston Athletics Communications (@UHCougarPR) September 30, 2022
And to even the American Athletic Conference’s official football Twitter feed throwing shade at broadcast partner ESPN:
Baseball-free highlights from the @GreenWaveFB overtime win against Houston Friday night.https://t.co/j8PGo4kIMY#AmericanFB x #RollWave
— American Football (@American_FB) October 1, 2022
There were many cut-ins since Friday, and there have been many jokes about Judge at-bats interrupting actual sports since then. But that Tulane-Houston game was notable as one of the first events repeatedly and thoroughly interrupted by Judge coverage at crucial times.
Well, Judge finally hit his 62nd home run Tuesday. That ended the long national nightmare for those college football fans looking to watch their games rather than him (and interestingly enough, ESPN did not cut into the E:60 NWSL feature they were showing for that), and it led to notable calls on YES and WFAN. And on Wednesday, the Tulane football account had a good joke about this, interrupting their own uniform reveal video with Michael Kay’s YES call of Judge’s 62nd:
Uniform reveal, but Aaron Judge hit his 62nd homer
I guess we’ll try again tomorrow 🤷♂️#RollWave pic.twitter.com/F392cCsldm
— Tulane Football (@GreenWaveFB) October 5, 2022
Well played, Green Wave, well played. And Wednesday marks the last day of the MLB regular season, so there shouldn’t be any further cut-ins specifically for Judge after that.
However, baseball in general is still going to have an impact on college football; this weekend’s Wild Card games on ESPN, ABC, and ESPN2 mean that some college football gets bumped down the pecking order of ESPN networks, and Tulane’s own game Saturday (they host the East Carolina Pirates at 3:30 p.m. Eastern) will be on ESPNU. But at least that game definitely won’t get interrupted by Judge at-bats, as the Yankees have a bye through the Wild Card round.
[Green Wave Football on Twitter]
