Joel Klatt is no stranger to bold takes, at least when it comes to college football. But now he’s stretching his wings to the field of music and entertainment, by speaking into existence the idea of a Nate Bargatze Super Bowl halftime show.
The response to this year’s halftime show for Super Bowl 59 starring Kendrick Lamar was polarizing to say the least. People either loved it or hated it, and odds are that your age, your place of residence, and whoever you voted for in the Presidential election were probably deciding factors.
Given the response to Kendrick Lamar’s halftime show, Fox college football analyst Joel Klatt had his own idea for how to unify the country once again with a performance that everyone could love.
A stand-up comedy set from Nate Bargatze!
Yes, really.
New idea!!! Super Bowl halftime with a 10 min set from @natebargatze??
Nobody knows!
— Joel Klatt (@joelklatt) February 10, 2025
Nothing would speak to the shifting cultural winds of the moment like following a rap icon with a clean comedian from Tennessee, right?
Sure, his style may not be for everyone, but Nate Bargatze is legitimately hilarious. You can’t watch his SNL George Washington skits and not laugh. He’s selling out arenas across the country. But shifting the Super Bowl to a halftime comedy show would be one of the biggest shocks in the history of entertainment.
The Super Bowl halftime show has always featured musical acts, going all the way back to the early days of the big game when college marching bands provided the entertainment and Up With People provided multiple performances. It didn’t become a cultural phenomenon until Super Bowl XXXVII in 1993 at the Rose Bowl when Michael Jackson performed. Literally just four years before that, an Elvis impersonator was the star attraction. I kid you not. That actually happened.
In the years after, the halftime show grew until Justin Timberlake and Janet Jackson’s wardrobe malfunction in 2004. After a few years of safer, aging rockers, the NFL returned to pop with stars like Beyonce, Lady Gaga, and The Weeknd featured among others. And now the Super Bowl halftime show is arguably bigger than it ever has been.
Since 2019, the NFL has partnered with Jay-Z’s Roc Nation on the Super Bowl halftime show and the partnership was recently extended. The league seems more than happy with the direction of the event, no matter how many people may be wanting something different. So unless Jay-Z is a huge Nate Bargatze fan, don’t expect this idea to happen anytime soon.
But we can dream, right? It’s a distressing time in America and any distractions to our current state of affairs are welcome. Families who haven’t talked to each other in years over the nation’s political divide could start building bridges with each other by debating this idea. Just imagine explaining to your parents at the Thanksgiving dinner table why their favorite comedian would bomb in front of 130 million people.
And let’s be honest, the sheer amount of content and molten hot reactions from all sides that would come from a Nate Bargatze Super Bowl halftime show would be more entertaining than any show that could possibly exist.
