Jess Sims and Andrew Marchand Credit: ESPN, Andrew Marchand
By Sean Keeley on

College GameDay reporter Jess Sims was inside Michigan Stadium on Saturday morning before The Game between the Wolverines and Buckeyes, and she wanted to make sure her coworkers and the audience at home understood just how cold it was on the field.

“Iā€™m glad that it feels there because it is cold as sh*t in the stadium,” Sims told Rece Davis in response to how the GameDay set didn’t feel too chilly. “So just wait for it.”

It’s not as though we’ve never heard cursing on GameDay, but it was somewhat surprising to hear it so blatantly from someone other than Pat McAfee (though Nick Saban has been known to let loose, too).

Sports media insider Andrew Marchand doesn’t want to be a scold, but he wasn’t a fan of Sims dropping an S-bomb live on ESPN on a Saturday morning. He also thinks it’s proof of a larger issue GameDay and ESPN are facing regarding how McAfee’s treatment trickles down.

“Jess Sims, she said the S-word on GameDay, saying how cold it was for the game that she was covering, Michigan and Ohio State. This is the McAfee-ization of the show,” Marchand said on the latest episode of Marchand & Meterparel. “I don’t think that’s needed. Now, you can call me a prude. I swear all the time in my life. But when you’re ESPN, you’re Disney, is that necessary?

“Now, I know they let McAfee on from 12:00 to 2:00, and he’s allowed to swear during the week. And then now people swear on the weekend. A few years ago, if someone just said the S-word for no reason like Jess Sims did the other day, it’d be a big deal. I’m not really blaming Jess Sims. It’s just what they’ve developed there with ESPN.

“Look, this is the way I look at it. I know we live in a much cruder world with the internet, with politics, with everything, and I understand that. But I will say this: we all have a choice of how we want to act. I’m not perfect in any way. I don’t like when people act as if they’re holier than now. None of us are. But if you’re ESPN, it’s a 9-to-noon show. Kids are watching. I get it, people know swears, and some people will be like, ‘Oh, you’re just being prude.’ There’s just no need for it.

“Does it add anything? I would say it doesn’t. So all these things. Cruder world, et cetera, we all get to act how we think you should act. If ESPN, Disney, that’s what they think is appropriate, for 9:00 to noon. I would disagree with that.”

We can see Marchand’s point, especially if GameDay is supposed to be family-friendly entertainment. However, the Rubicon he’s worried about was really crossed a long time ago. Handmade signs visible behind the GameDay desk routinely feature crude innuendos. McAfee and Saban have dropped more F-bombs and S-bombs than we can remember. And speaking of McAfee, comments like the one he made about Aidan Hutchinson’s “girth” on Saturday are a feature, not a bug.

Just as they did with McAfee, we imagine ESPN executives would hand-wave away Sims’ NSFW moment and move on. As Marchand noted, we’re in a different world than the one coddled by cable TV for so many years.

Despite his protestations to avoid being considered a prude, Marchand took his fair share of, well, sh*t from colleagues such as Jimmy Traina and Richard Deitsch.

About Sean Keeley

Along with writing for Awful Announcing and The Comeback, Sean is the Managing Editor for Comeback Media. Previously, he created the Syracuse blog Troy Nunes Is An Absolute Magician and wrote 'How To Grow An Orange: The Right Way to Brainwash Your Child Into Rooting for Syracuse.' He has also written non-Syracuse-related things for SB Nation, Curbed, and other outlets. He currently lives in Seattle where he is complaining about bagels. Send tips/comments/complaints to sean@thecomeback.com.

View all posts by Sean Keeley