Former Indianapolis Colts punter Pat McAfee’s weird and winding road through the sports media world continues. On Monday, ESPN announced that they had signed McAfee to a multi-year deal to serve as a football analyst, primarily on the network’s Thursday night college football game of the week alongside Adam Amin, Matt Hasselbeck, and Molly McGrath.
Following his retirement, McAfee proclaimed that he wanted to “take over the bum ass media that’s in sports,” and thus far, he’s at least attempted to live up to that statement. Soon after, he joined Barstool Sports, left a year and a half later, and this past season, he called a Week 17 NFL game on Fox, earning himself some attention for his reaction following a successful fake field goal.
McAfee also tweeted out a video announcing the move.
Ladies and gentlemen… I'm the luckiest dude on earth.
Thursday nights are about to be a GREAT time on @ESPN with @Hasselbeck, @AdamAmin, and @MollyAMcGrath.
We're just getting started beautiful people… pic.twitter.com/klS64uDFqe
— Pat McAfee (@PatMcAfeeShow) July 29, 2019
McAfee has also done work with WWE, which drew some attention earlier this year, and ESPN notes that McAfee’s “work with other media outlets will continue”. That sounds like good news for McAfee, who seemingly won’t be tethered to ESPN in the way that so many on-air personalities are.
I have no idea if McAfee’s enthusiasm from that one NFL game seven months ago will show up every week, especially when dealing with college football matchups that might not be the most exciting. But ESPN feels like he’ll be a good fit, and this feels like a strong hire from them.
[ESPN]
