Shane Gillis took aim at Caitlin Clark, Donald Trump, Aaron Rodgers and Bill Belichick in his 2025 ESPYS monologue. Screen grab: ESPN
By Ben Axelrod on

Shane Gillis did not, in fact, worship at the altar of athletes on Wednesday night.

How his monologue at the 2025 ESPYS was ultimately received is a story for another day. But the comedian and Tires star very much went for it over the course of his 10-minute opening act, in which he took aim at athletes, coaches and politicians, before paying tribute to 1998 ESPYS host Norm Macdonald.

Gillis opened his set playing it safe, joking that everybody seated around Shai Gilgeous-Alexander was already in foul trouble. It didn’t take long, however, until the Pennsylvania native turned to politics, referencing President Donald Trump’s recent announcement that the White House will host a UFC event in 2026.

“Donald Trump wants to stage a UFC fight on the White House lawn. The last time he staged a fight in D.C., Mike Pence almost died,” Gillis said. “Actually, there was supposed to be an Epstein joke here, but I guess it got deleted. It probably deleted itself, right? It probably never existed actually. Let’s move on as a country and ignore that.”

Following a joke about Trump wanting to deport Juan Soto, Gillis then made reference to Aaron Rodgers’ infamous aversion to the COVID-19 vaccine, stating that the 4-time MVP didn’t want to take it because “he predicted that it would be bad for him.”

“And then he joined the New York Jets,” he quipped. “So maybe he wasn’t right about everything.”

The Beautiful Dogs star also managed to tie together a joke about the seemingly forgotten Shohei Ohtani gambling scandal to a string of punchlines about Bill Belichick and Jordon Hudson’s relationship.

But perhaps his most memorable — and controversial — joke of the monologue came as he poked fun at reigning WNBA Rookie of the Year Caitlin Clark.

“When Caitlin Clark retires from the WNBA, she’s going to work at a Waffle House so she can continue doing what she loves most: fist-fighting Black women,” Gillis said.

Gillis received a mixed reaction from the audience that was primarily comprised of athletes and seemed to provide real-time play-by-play of how he thought the monologue was going. Toward the end of it, he paid tribute to the late Macdonald by repurposing his famous joke about O.J. Simpson from his 1998 monologue.

“Congratulations, Travis Hunter. Winning the Heisman, that’s something they can never take away from you,” he said. “Unless you kill your wife and a waiter — in which case, they can take that away from you.”

“Well, I see a lot of you don’t like me and that’s OK,” Gillis continued as he wrapped up the monologue. “That’s it for me. That went about as well as we all thought it was going to go. I don’t know why this happened.”

If you were a Shane Gillis fan entering the monologue, you probably enjoyed it and if you weren’t, then you probably didn’t. But while he wasn’t wrong that the audience of athletes didn’t seem to appreciate his humor, his ESPYS monologue was the one thing that no other since Macdonald’s nearly 30 years ago has been: memorable.

About Ben Axelrod

Ben Axelrod is a veteran of the sports media landscape, having most recently worked for NBC's Cleveland affiliate, WKYC. Prior to his time in Cleveland, he covered Ohio State football and the Big Ten for outlets including Cox Media Group, Bleacher Report, Scout and Rivals.

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