It’s no exaggeration to say Pat McAfee reinvented the sports media business almost singlehandedly, but he’s not stopping now.
The ESPN commentator and WWE announcer will debut his “Big Night Aht” concept in Pittsburgh, his hometown, on Wednesday night. McAfee is billing the sold-out event, hosted at the nearly-20,000 seat PPG Paints Arena downtown, as a “variety show” in the vein of The Dean Martin Show, which McAfee grew up watching with his grandmother.
McAfee explained his big dreams for the event in a recent appearance on Footbahlin with Ben Roethlisberger.
“This is a ‘I have to find out if it’s possible or not’ show,” McAfee said. “I’ve been thinking about this for years.”
The host of The Pat McAfee Show, which ESPN licenses for eight figures annually, wants “Big Night Aht” to bring people together for music, comedy, entertainment and sports. And the emphasis is on “Big.”
McAfee believes there is still space for those old-fashioned variety shows, and he believes he can pull it off on a massive scale, live in a city like Pittsburgh, and perhaps across the country.
“I remember there was a variety show concept, where all the big stars came to do a show, just to do a show,” McAfee said of the early television days in the 1960s and 70s. “And I remember it was talked about as, you hear about these acts but you don’t really get to experience them. And nowadays, I think the award shows were supposed to be the variety shows. I think they became the gathering of talent, where people are going to entertain. And for one reason or another, whether it’s the business side, the agent side, the platform side, there’s so many different people working against people kind of coming together.”
“Big Night Aht” begins at 8 p.m. ET and will be livestreamed on McAfee’s YouTube, X and TikTok feeds. McAfee also announced on PMS recently that Hulu will air video of the full event on Thursday at 8 p.m. ET, along with behind-the-scenes footage.
🚨BREAKING NEWS🚨
There will be a re-air Thursday, April 10th of Big Night AHT on Hulu with exclusive behind the scenes footage #PMSLive pic.twitter.com/CxpQgEzAiG
— Pat McAfee (@PatMcAfeeShow) April 4, 2025
McAfee explained that he uses his side gig as a ring-side announcer on WWEÂ Raw to learn more about in-arena production. With his connections across the worlds of sports and entertainment, McAfee is ready to try it starting Wednesday night in his hometown.
“I want people to be able to experience a show that is high-level, the tops of industries, just coming together just to entertain the s*** out of people,” McAfee said. “I’ve always wanted to do it. I thought it would be a cool thing to bring [performers] together almost, especially from different worlds that might not interact with each other a lot.”
And as on his daily sports talk show, McAfee also plans to do big giveaways.
However, McAfee wouldn’t promise that “Big Night Aht” will turn into a countrywide touring revue. This is just an experiment — for now.
“Will there be a future one? I don’t know,” McAfee said. “I’m investing a lot of money in this … the concept in and of itself has been years, I would say. It’s an actual passion project. And also, pricey. It’s a pricey project as well. But it’s worth it, because I think we’ll be able to showcase that one of these shows could work, and that’s kind of the goal.”
