FOX and Barstool Sports reached an agreement late last week that will see FOX air some Barstool content, and most importantly, place Barstool founder and CEO Dave Portnoy on the Big Noon Kickoff desk as a co-host.
A lot of fans slammed the move. Fans of Barstool see it as Portnoy selling out to legacy media. Detractors of Barstool are not looking forward to seeing more of Portnoy.
Many assumed Portnoy's joining Big Noon was a move being made to combat Pat McAfee on ESPN's College GameDay. But according to details that have been released on FOX's plans, they actually have a different ESPN commentator in mind that they hope Portnoy will rival.
Sports media insider John Ourand shared the following:
"FOX executives see a chance to insert a big personality to their lineup, and to leverage Portnoy's Michigan fandom, which dovetails naturally with their Big Ten rights package. After all, ESPN has a number of high-profile commentators, like Paul Finebaum, who openly advocate for the SEC, especially when it comes to getting teams in the College Football Playoff."
ESPN and FOX are now just puppets in the ongoing SEC vs. Big Ten war
Media is supposed to be unbiased, but that's not possible when the media has a vested interest in one of the conferences that they cover.
ESPN landed the media rights for the SEC beginning in the 2024 season in a lucrative, long-term deal. They have a vested interest in the success of the league, which coincides with getting as many teams as possible in the College Football Playoff. ESPN has the biggest platform and the most successful pre-game show, College GameDay, and will undoubtedly shill for the conference where everything means more.
FOX has the rights to the biggest Big Ten game every week, and has hoped that placing it in the Noon ET window would increase ratings as the SEC tends to utilize the afternoon and evening windows for its bigger games. It gives the Noon window to the Big Ten by itself, instead of having to compete against the top SEC game in primetime.
Love him or hate him, Portnoy is unabashedly himself. He will not hide his Michigan and Big Ten fandom on the Big Noon desk. He will take plenty of potshots at the SEC every chance he gets, playing up the perceived Big Ten superiority as much as he can.
It's probably foolish to think that anything Portnoy says - or Finebaum for that matter - could influence the College Football Playoff committee, but the leagues, and their media partners, are pulling out all the stops in this cold war of supremacy.