"If Shaq, Kenny and Chuck aren't in the studio for this, we riot": CFB fans react to TNT Sports’ College Football Playoff news ft. ESPN
On Wednesday, it was announced that ESPN and TNT Sports have officially reached an agreement for the latter to broadcast a pair of games in the College Football Playoff for the next five seasons.
These CFP games will be also streamed on Max and the entire playoffs will be part of Venu Sports. The specific games are still not made public, but ESPN will release the bowl schedule on June 6. ESPN's $7.8 billion contract to retain the CFP signed in March has allowed a sublicensing deal like this to happen.
In 2024 and 2025, TNT will have two first-round games while the remaining three years will include two quarterfinal games as well. It is not known which specific bowl games those games will include.
Many fans online were excited about the possibilities that could be happening, particularly about a certain TNT crew:
"PUT CHUCK AND SHAQ IN THE BOOGER MOBILE," one person responded.
"Inside the college football playoff... please," one user posted.
However, it seems not everybody was excited about the potential of seeing Shaquille O'Neal, Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley talking about college football:
"Wow something nobody asked for," one Twitter user responded.
"Counterpoint: if Shaq, Kenny and Chuck *are* in the studio for this, we riot," another fan replied.
It is going to be interesting to see if TNT Sports will have some more focus on college football during the season as they do not have any other agreements with the sport at this time.
What does this mean for the future of the College Football Playoff?
The College Football Playoff is going to be interesting as this is the first year that the CFP has expanded from four teams to 12. While undergoing massive changes, such as tripling the number of teams qualifying to compete for the national championship during bowl season, this could lead to a lot of different things down the line.
One situation that this could lead to is multiple networks being associated with the College Football Playoff once its current contract finishes. Similar to how different sports entities have media rights with different networks, this could be how the College Football Playoff does it in the future. If that is the case, they could sell individual games to media rights holders and get their money that way.
Another wrinkle that this could add is further expansion as more networks get their fingers onto the College Football Playoff. There seems to be a demand by the networks so why wouldn't the CFP continue expanding? This will be interesting to keep an eye out for in the future.
What do you think of the new deal between ESPN and TNT Sports? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.